^\0 VIEWS 

N93 



or 



COLONIZATION, 




REV. JAMES NOURSE, A. M. 



STRIKE, BUT HBA.R XK. 



SECOND EDITION. 



N E W Y O R K : 

PUBLISHED BY 

THE AMERICAN ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY. 

No. 143 NASSAU STREET. 




Class. 
Book 



Eja^ 




VIEWS 



OF 



COLONIZATION. 



REV. JAMES NOURSE, A. M. 



STRIKE, BUT HEAR ME. 



SECOND KDITION. 



NEW YORK: 

PUBLISHED BY 

THE AMERICAN ANTI-SLAVERY SOCIETY, 

No. 143 NASSAU STREET. 

1839. 









2^^^ , jj 






PREFACE 



We are often told, by those who are averse to some of our 
measures, ' Well, we are abolitionists too, but — *» we have al- 
ways been unable to see why abolitionists should feel it neces- 
sary to be anti-colonizationists." — (e. g. N. Y. Observer, Feb. 
16, 1839.) In reply we say, " Friends, we humbly hope that 
we do not act or judge without good and substantial reasons ; 
and while we are ANTI.CoLONIZATIO^"ISTs, we even pretend to 
possess a little " Christian and common sense," (N. Y. Obs. 
idem,) as well as they who are simply colonizationalists.' 

Anti-Colonizationists are not always treated even with 
the measure of courtesy which is discoverable in the above quo- 
tations ; in which it is insinuated that they are wanting in 
'' Christian and common sense." Their would-be brethren, who 
are so warm abolitionists that they cannot get farther than co- 
lonization, manifest an expertness in complimenting us. We 
often meet in their writing with such beautiful " flowers" as 
the following : — " The name of Abolitionist, which justly belongs, 
as a name of honor, to all those States which have provided for 
the extinction of slavery within their own territoiy, and to every 
citizen of these States who approves and honors such a pohcy, 
has been perverted and degraded by being claimed as the dis- 
tinctive name of a bitter, contentious, and therefore obnoxious 
party," &c. — (Chr. Spectator, 1836, p. 115.) "Our people, 
[says Prof. Andrews, speaking for the Southerners,] have be- 
come exasperated, the friends of the slave alarmed, and nothing 
remains but that we \_i. e. all Southerners, even though friends 
of the slave!] should unite in repel Jing the officious intermed- 



IV PREFACE. 

dling of persons who do not understand the subject with which 
they are interlering." — (Idem, p. 165.) " In minds already lit- 
tle, anti-colonization finds a chamber ready swept and garnished ; 
but in more elevated spirits it has a work to do — it cannot stay, 
but it will wither and cast out the noble feeUngs of our nature. 
It is a little and belittling cause. It is, in this one thing, an apt 
resemblance of Milton's Pandemonium ; which, though it held 
the throne of Satan, and embraced a vast multitude, yet com- 
pelled the spirits within, Satan and his counsellors excepted, to 
shrink in their dimensions to the size 

' of that small infantry 

Warred on by cranes.' " (Idem, 1835, p. 563. 

Now we most respectfully thank our very warm abolition brethren, 
the colonizationists, for these and such hke favors — for they are 
many — with which they seem to have a propensity to plaster us 
— for, of all classes in the community, it appears to come most 
natural to them : yet we cannot help thinking, (when they pro- 
claim themselves "abolitionists too,") of " How we apples swim !" 
And if the homely comparison of our thoughts should seem even 
a little coarse, it has the merit of being equally classical as that 
of Pandemonium and the frogs, above. 

Such indeed is the peculiar charity of our colonization brethren 
toward us, that we have learned to esteem their ordinary flatter- 
ies quite common-place, especially since we know enough of 
human nature to expect that when a good cause, once abused, 
begins, by its own merits, to emerge from beneath public odi- 
um, they who were most foul-mouthed in its condemnation will 
be willing to appear not so much its enemies after all. Take, 
for instance, the following : — « We do not approve, it is true, 
in some important particulars, their principles or their spirit, 
but their end is noble : their aims are, on the whole, benevolent 
and patriotic : the basis of their constitution is essentially truth, 
and their success — unless they hinder it by holding dangerous 
error and unhallowed fire in union with their benevolence and 
truth — is certain. [Will the world believe these disinterested 
brethren ?] All that we are now contending against is their 
strangely and almost unaccountably turning aside from the pur- 



PREFACE. V 

pose to which the constitution of their society limits them, to 
hinder the success of anotlier cause, equally distinct, although 
collateral — their persecuting it, and avowing its entire over- 
throw. iL is the unauthorised (!) and unconstitutional enter- 
prise of anli-colonization, which is the root of by far the greater 
part of the bitterness, misapprehension, disparagement of mo- 
tives, and, occasionally, something like malignity, in which a 
large part even of the most estimable anti-colonizationists do 
really appear to indulge."— (Chr, Spect. 18^35, p. 512.) 

They who have watched the course of events which have 
transpired in the political, the commercial, and theological world, 
for sume years past, will not fail to acknowledge, that the crimes 
charged upon abolitionists have at least appeared to coloniza- 
tionists. J3ut what shall we say of the " bitterness, disparage, 
raent of motives, and malignity," which abolitionists have been 
called to endure from their brethren who are on the other side 1 
Have not these things originated in the hatred which is felt to 
anti-colonization 1 Evidently. But what else can abolitionists 
be, than opposers of colonization ? Both in the North and in 
the South, colonizationists, with the exception of the « Specta- 
tor,'' and some others, have associated themselves with the 
avowed friends of slavery, or with the foes of liberty and equal 
rights. Separate, therefore, from any conclusion to which abo- 
litionists might arrive, in regard to the real merits of coloniza- 
tion, in itself considered, they have generally been drawn into 
a combat with if, because, in a great degree, it identified itself 
with their opponents. It is, therefore, even in this view, neither 
strange nor unaccountable, that the enemies of slavery should 
turn aside (if the charge indeed were truo) " from the purpose to 
which the constitution of the Anti-Slavery Society limits them, to 
hinder the success of another cause," distinct indeed, but not 
collateral, viz. colonization. We can do no less than oppose it, 
because it stands in the way of Liberty ; and to attack and over- 
throw it, if possible, comes legitimately in our way. 

The colonizationists, generally, are sensitive and irritable, and 
their views warped, on the whole subject of Human Rights, by 
their opinions of the colonization scheme. But Truth asks of 
them, and of all others, only fair play. Let her be heard. Let 



VI PREFACE. 

colonization be tried by the Divine law, or by the rules of com- 
mon virtue, (if the former seems too strict,) and if found want- 
ing, let it be condemned. And let not our brethren grow angry 
and malignant, because we disprove the virtue of their pet. Let 
them meet the question fairly ; and if they are anxious for the 
advance of human happiness, as they profess, let them see that 
the cause of colonization is essentially the cause of slavery and 
human misery. 

Here we take our stand. We examine colonization, and try 
it by its own merits. Excitement against it, owing to its occa- 
sional company — slavery or lynch-law, shall not so prejudge it in 
our minds that we cannot hear its claims. If it can bear trial, 
let it stand ; if it cannot, let it fall, though political men, self- 
interested merchants, or learned and religious men advocate it. 

The writer of the following brief essay — an essay which might 
be enlarged on several of its topics — hopes that he has been un- 
prejudiced while discussing the moral value of the colonization 
scheme. He dares avow himself an Anti-Colonizationist, 
because he is an Abolitionist ; and adds, that there are, to his 
mind, three absurdities, which, in connection with this subject, 
his fellow-men are guilty of: — 1st, To imagine themselves go- 
verned by the rales of the Gospel, while they remain coloniza- 
tionists : 2. To imagine themselves abolitionists, while they are 
colonizationists : 3. To profess themselves colonizationists, and 
at the same time know what slavery is. 

P. S. Tiie first edition of this Essay was printed without the 
author's inspection ; some mistakes, therefore, occurred, which 
have been corrected in this. 

Valley, Pa. April, 1839. 



COLONIZATION 



CHAPTER I. 

THE COLONIZATION SOCIETY. MOTIVES AND OBJECTS OF 

ITS AUTHORS AND SUPPORTERS. IS THE COLONIZATION 

SOCIETY ENTITLED TO THE AID OF BENEVOLENCE ? 

Is it such a fast that I have chosen ? 
Is not THIS the fast that I have chosen ? 
To loose the bands of wickedness ; 
To undo the heavy burdens ; 
To let the oppressed go free ; 
And that ye break every yoke. 

Isaiah^ Iviii. 5, 6. 

Section 1. Origin of the Colonization Society, and of the 
Colony. 

The Colonization Society was organized in Washing- 
ton City, near the commencement of the year 1817. — 
The Constitution of the Society declares that " the object 
to which its attention is to be exclusively directed, is to 
promote and execute a plan for colonizing, (with their 
own consent,) the free people of color residing in our 
country, in Africa, or such other place as Congress shall 
deem most expedient." The Society has been in opera- 
tion for more than twenty years, during the greater part 
of which period it has been steadily pursuing its object ; 
not, however, confining its labors to the removal of those 
persons who were kcQ before their removal, but removing 
others that they might be free. Among the individuals 
most prominent in procuring its organization, were Dr. 
Finley of New Jersey, and Samuel J. Mills. Much ap- 
probation was bestowed upon the Society, as well by ma- 



8 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

ny distinguished men in the Southern states, as in the 
Northern. The first important measure of the Society, 
was to send a mission of inquiry to Africa, and for this 
purpose Mills and Burgess sailed from Philadelphia, No- 
vember 16, 1817, and spent about two months on the 
African coast, surveying it, and seeking for a place of 
settlement. Early in 1820, the Society removed from 
Georgia a number of re-captured Africans, with some free 
people of color, amounting to eighty, and made a tem- 
porary settlement on Sherbro Island, where they were 
attacked by disease ; and three agents and twenty of the 
colonists were carried off by death. In the spring of 
1821, Messrs. Andrews and Wiltberger, agents of the 
Society, and Messrs. Winn and E. Bacon, agents of the 
United States, came on the coast with additional colonists, 
and after encountering great difficulties, failed in purchas- 
ing land for a colony. This, however, was accomplished 
afterwards, by Dr. Ayres and Lieut. Stockton of the 
United States Navy, who, by terrifying the natives, suc- 
ceeded at length in this object, by the purchase of Messu- 
rado, a cape and territory. Here a settlement was soon 
begun, by the colonists who had formerly settled at Sher- 
bro, but had in the mean while removed to Fourah-bay 
in the neighborhood of Sierra-Leone. Several difRcul. 
ties occurred with the natives, but were setUed by Dr. 
Ayres, who shortly left the colony on a visit to the Unit- 
ed States. In the mean while Mr, Ashmun arrived, and 
found himself scarcely settled, when it became necessary 
to defend the colony by arms, from a murderous attack 
of 800 natives, November 11, 1821, which attack was 
renewed by 1500 on the 2d December. These were 
driven off, not without the loss of many lives on the part 
of the natives, and some of the colonists. Mr. Ashmun 
remained in the colony till the year 1828, when on ac- 
count of ill health he returned to the United States ; only, 
however, to die among his friends. During the period of 
his agency, the colony, governed with much prudence and 
ibiliiy, increased in importance and population. And 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 9 

since, the several reinforcements from the United States, 
with a union of some few settlers, having constantly ad- 
ded to the number, the population now amounts to about 
4,000. These are scattered over a large space, in sev- 
eral settlements ; some under the patronage and care of 
different societies which have sprung up in aid of the 
American Colonization Society. To appearance at pre- 
sent the colony seems to be advancing, though improve- 
ments have been slowly entered upon, owing to the cir- 
cumstances of the case, and the character of the settlers. 
The expenses, amounting to more than $500,000, have 
been defrayed, partly by individual donations, and in part 
by the State Legislatures of some of the slaveholding 
States. [See Reports of Am. Col. Soc. passim.) 

Section 2. Motives and objects of the Authors and Pro- 
moters of Colonization. 
This plan of colonizing the free people of color, was 
proposed originally through kindness and Christian phi- 
lanthropy on the part of Dr. Finley, Samuel J. Mills and 
many others. The projectors concluded that no other 
plan was then practicable, by which the people of color 
could be raised from their generally depressed condition, 
and allowed to enjoy the full blessings of freedom. " We 
were at Washington, in December 1817, and there met 
the Rev. Dr. Finley and the Rev. Samuel J. Mills, and 
in conversation with both these gentlemen, heard them 
both advocate African Colonization, as the only practica- 
ble method of ultimately extinguishing slavery in the Unit' 
ed States.'' (Colonization Herald, Philadelphia, 1836.) 
That the motives of such men as have been named were 
good no doubt can be entertained ; yet it must be care- 
fully examined whether the views cind judgments which 
gave impulse to those kind feelings were correct. But 
these good men were not the only persons who encour- 
aged and patronized the Colonization scheme, when it 
was first projected. That the views of other patrons 
were widely difTerent, the Colonization Society has itself 



10 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

admitted. Some espoused it, as a means of ridding the 
slave States of their free colored population ; considering 
the residence of that class, in a land of slavery, danger. 
ous to themselves and to slavery. " The Plon. Charles 
F. Mercer had, for some time previously to the establish- 
ment of the Society, made its design a subject of much 
reflection, communicated his sentiments to others, and by 
a well-timed effort in the Legislature of Virginia, secured 
the adoption of resolutions, which had unquestionably 
much effect upon the decisions of the meeting which or- 
ganized the institution, and a most favorable influence 
upon its earliest operations." {Af. Repos., vol. 1. 88.) 
Mr. Mercer, in a report to Congress, March 3, 1827, 
speaks thus : — " All must concur in regarding the present 
condition of the colored race in America, as inconsist- 
ent with its future social and political advancement, and 
where slavery exists at all, as calculated to aggravate its 
evils without any atoning good. Their own conscious- 
ness of their degraded condition in the United States has 
appeared to the North as well as the South, in their re- 
peated efforts to find a territory beyond the limits of the 
Union, to which they may retire. Anterior to the year 
1808, three several attempts to procure a country suited 
to this object, had been secretly made by the General 
Assembly of Virginia ; — the last, but at the same time the 
earliest 'public effort to attain this object, was made by the 
Legislature of the same State in December, 1816, some 
time before the formation, in the city of V/ashington, of 
the Am.erican Society for Colonizing the Free People of 
Color. The design of this institution, the committee are 
apprised, originated in the disclosure of the secret resolu- 
tions of prior Legislatures of that State. This brief and 
correct history of the American Colonization Society, 
evinces that it sprung from a deep solicitude for southern 
interests, and among those most competent to discern 
them," (Af. Repos., IV. 53, 54.*) In the same report, 

* The Christian Spectator, October, 1835, charges Mr. Jay with 
dishonesty, in representing the Colonization Society as originating 



VIEWS ON COLONIZATION. 11 

Mr. Mercer touches upon the inconvenience and danger 
of multiplying manumissions, (pp. 52, 53,) and subse- 
quently declared his conviction, that slaves ought not to 
be liberated in this country ; for, *' emancipation and colo- 
nization must go hand in hand." {Af. Repos. IV. 303.) 
This gentleman, however, with truth, may be viewed as 
the representative of a class of supporters differing from 
the first, who, while they would not justify slavery in the 
abstract, justify its present practice and continuance un- 
der the circumstances of the case. Others, of different 
mind, united with the Society at first ; Jackson and Cal- 
houn were among its early officers — " its most important 
officers," {Af. Repos., I. 90,)— and "John Randolph, that 
remarkably tenacious holder of slaves, that unflinching 
advocate of slavery, through evil as well as good report, 

in Virginia ; or being connected with the resolutions of the Vir- 
ginia Legislature. It may be doubted, however, whether the 
Spectator is not itself liable to a retort of the charge ; or will it for 
once confess itself a little ignorant of the true, or at least the ad- 
mitted state of the case. Tlie reader may consult the African Re. 
pository, Vol. I. p. 88, and compare it with Vol. IV. p. 54, and the 
following statements : " In the year 1816, the Legislature of Virginia^ 
solemnly impressed with the momentous interest of the scheme, 
and deprecating the increasing dangers of delay, appealed with an 
almost unanimous voice to the general government for its aid in 
procuring an asylum for the reception of its free colored popula- 
tion. Influenced by these examples, some fifteen or twenty of the 
best and wisest men of the nation, formed themselves into a socie- 
ty, called " The American Society for Colonizing," &c. (Cyrus 
Edwards, Ai.Rei)os. VII. 90.) " The Northern States have sent 
us some good things — they have sent us men who have become 
useful and good citizens, [ i. e,, — a thing, very common, — they 
became slaveholders,] but they did not send us the Colonization 
Society — this is an institution of our own." — (Rev. Mr. Atkmson, 
Af. Repos. XII. 65.) But what does the Society itself say ? After 
referring to the acts of the Virginia Legislature, December, 1815, 
and quoting the preamble and resolutions, it adds, — " Encouraged 
by this movement on the part of a State so distinguished as Vir. 
ginia, and so deeply interQsted in the subject of the resolution, a 
number of gentlemen, friendly to the plan of African Colonisation, 
assembled in the city of Washington," &c. (Af. Repos. XII. 51.) 
— Perhaps however, the Spectator will call even this evidence dis- 
honest, inasmuch as it contains an acknowledgment of a desire to 



12 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

and who could pronounce the Declaration of Independ- 
ence, because it asserts the doctrine of equal rights, a 
* fanfaronade of nonsense,' took a prominent part in form- 
ing the Colonization Society."* (Af. Repos. XI. 67.) 
That Slavery is a sin, is the doctrine of a free and en- 
lightened country ; that Slavery is an evil, but not a sin in 
present practice, is the old but now almost antiquated 
Virginia doctrine: that Slavery is neither a sin, nor an 
evil, and is never to be abolished, is the old South Caro- 
lina doctrine, now in the ascendant : — they who held then 
different and opposite views harmonized in the institution 
of the Colonization Society, and each class expected to 
gain its individual object : 

The object formally proposed was the removal to 
"another country of those among the colored population 
who were already free, or who were expected to become 

aid Virginia, — «« so deeply interested." (See also Clay^s Speech^ 
VI. 13.) [It appears from documents published in the African Re- 
pository that it was planned by Southern slaveholders, and by them 
communicated to Finleyon his arrival in Washington, late in 1816. 
That he had thought of some such plan before, is altogether proba- 
ble ; but we are not aware that he had matured any plan, much 
less that he had communicated any to others, before he had Intel- 
ligence that certain individuals at the South were already moving 
in the matter. Be this as it may, however, it is certain that at 
a public dinner given in Charleston, Virginia, to Charles F. Mer- 
cer, one of the toasts spoke of him as " the founder of the Colony 
of Liberia," and in the speech in which he acknowledged the com- 
pliment, he states that in the spring of 1816, he "concerted with 
F. S. Key and E. B. Caldwell, a plan" for action on the subject 
of colonizing the colored people, which he communicated to others 
on a journey to the North during the ensuing summer. (A^ee Af. 
Rep. IX. 265.) In the course of the next winter, as is well known, 
the Colonization Society was formed. 

J. B. Harrison, in a speech at its eleventh annual meeting, (Af. 
Rep. III. 331.) says, '* the plan of this association is exactly that 
originated by herself [Virginia] in its objects, its scope, its adjuncts, 
its inevitable tendencies," &c.; and adds, that the plan "had been 
shown through the State from March till December, and was 
finally adopted with hardly a dissenting voice in the General As. 
eembly."] 

* Mr. Randolph changed his views before he died. 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 13 

free." Great evils were supposed to result from the in- 
crease of free colored persons. And in regard to the 
scheme we find this language used by Henry Clay. 
" However difficult it might have been supposed in exe- 
cution, it was an obvious remedy ; (i. e. for the evils he 
had, as he says in the previous part of his speech, 
'* sketched," as resulting from manumission, and " from 
the incongruous elements of population separated from 
each other by invincible prejudices, and by natural 
causes,") and the suggestion may be referred back to a 
period as remote as the revolutionary war." " From its 
origin and throughout the whole period of its existence, 
it [the Colonization Society] has constantly disclaimed 
all intention whatever of interfering, in the smallest de- 
gree, with the rights of property, or the object of eman- 
cipation gradual or remote. It is not only without power, 
but it is without inclination to make any such interfer- 
ence." {Af. Repos. VI. 12, 13.) We will therefore 
consider it unquestionable, notwithstanding the surmise 
of many to the contrary, that this representation is true. 
It is indeed a representation, not only made by the dis- 
tinguished civilian whose name is connected with it, but 
repeated by many advocates of the Society. — About the 
time of its organization, Dr. Robert Finlev of New 
Jersey, sometimes claimed as Father of the Society, 
wrote thus — " What shall we do with the free people of 
color ? What can we do for their happiness, consistently 
with our own ? — are questions often asked by the think- 
ing mind. The desire to make them happy has often 
been felt, but the dif^culty of devising and accomplishing 
an efficient plan, has hitherto appeared too great for hu- 
manity itself to accomplish. — At present, as if by a Divine 
impulse, men of virtue, piety and reflection are turning 
their thoughts to this subject, and seem to see the wished- 
for plan unfoldinfl^ in the gradual separation of the black 
from the white 'population, by providing for the former 
some suitahle situation, where they may enjoy the advan- 
tages to ivhir.h they are entitled by nature a?id their Crea- 
2 



14 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION 

tor's will. (Af. Repos. IX. 332., see also his letter, 
Rcpos. 1, 2.) In these statements of Mr. Clay and Dr. 
Finley, it cannot be questioned with justice, that the au. 
thors express the views of Colonizationists generally, in 
regard to one point. It is taken for granted, that the 
free people of color must remove., in order to " enjoy 
those advantages," [more properly Finley should have 
said "rights," for so he meant,] " to which they are en- 
titled by nature, and their Creator's will :" and this re- 
moval, so far as it respects those now rn bondage, or 
hereafter to be, is to be effected, while still the right of 
property in slaves is acknowledged, or at least not openly, 
for the present, questioned. 

Now it is remarkable, while this removal of the whole 
or a part of the colored population, is the supposed and 
proposed work of Colonization, — that there is no ques- 
tioning of the propriety of tlmt spirit and feeling in the 
community which renders their removal in an}?" sense 
necessary or expedient. The language used upon this 
whole subject is generally such as the following ; " Tax 
your utmost powers of imagination, and you cannot con- 
ceive one motive to honorable effort, which can animate 
the bosom, or give impulse to the conduct of a free- 
black in this country. Let him toil fi*om youth to age 
in the honorable pursuit of wisdom — let him store his 
mind with the most valuable researches of science and 
literature — and let him add to a highly gifted and culti- 
vated intellect, a pure piety, ' undefiled, and unspotted 
from the world' — it is all nothing : — he would not be re- 
ceived into the lowest walks of society. If we were con- 
strained to admire so uncommon a being, our very admi- 
ration would mingle with disgust, because, in the physical 
organization of his frame, we meet an insurmountable 
barrier even to an approach to social intercourse ; and in 
the Egyptian color, which nature has stamped upon his 
features, a principle of repulsion, so stf'ong as to forbid 
the idea of a communion either of interest or of feeling, 
as utterly abhorrent. Whether these feelings are founded 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 15 

in reason or not, we will not now inquire — perhaps they 
are not. But education and habit and prejudice, have so 
firmly riveted them upon us, that they have become as 
strong as nature itself, and to expect their removal, or 
even their slightest modification, would be as idle and 
preposterous as to expect that we could reach forth our 
hands, and remove the mountains from their foundations 
into the valleys which are beneath ihem." (C. L. Moshy, 
Af. Repos. VII. 230, 231— see also Af. Repos. V. 51.) 
This extract embodies the prmciple of Colonizalionism, 
" Education, hahit, and more especially prejudice"* against 
their color, render it necessary, as is admitted by most 
of the intelligent Colonizationists themselves, that all co- 
lored persons should remove. They affirm that these 
persons cannot be elevated in society here ; but more, 
they acknowledge the depressions of that class, as they 
exist, but consider these depressions unavoidable : they 
are willing also to ascribe these depressions and injuries 
to the " prejudice" against color. If we may judge 
from the published opinions of eminent Colonizationists, 
this is their prime rule of action, and thus is it exhibited. — 
"The scheme of African Colonization, offers in the first 
place to relieve the country from one of the direst results 
of slavery, the free black population : — They must go 
AWAY OR PERISH." {R. J. Breckenridgc.) So it has 
been the constant policy of the Colonization Society to 
decry the free colored population, taking it for granted 
that they must and will be compelled to emigrate to Africa 
in the course of time. " No scheme of Abolition will 

* ''Men always hate and despise those whom they oppress, and 
thus attempt to cheat and silence conscience. It is because the 
negro has been oppressed, that he is hated and despised. The 
prejudice against Jews seems quite unaccountable to us, but it has 
exactly the same foundation with our prejudice against negroes. 
It is founded in oppression and wickedness. The prejudice against 
the negro arises from oppression and wickedness, it is itself wick- 
edness, and therefore it is neither justifiable nor invincible." (C. 
E. Stowe^ Cincinnati, a Colonizationist, sui generis : standing as 
respects this sentiment in "lone conspicuity.") 



16 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

meet my support, that leaves the emancipated blacks 
amon^ us. Experience has proved that they become a 
corrupt and degraded class, as burdensome to themselves 
as they are hurtful to the rest of society. Shut out from 
the privileges of citizens, they can never amalgamate with 
us, but must remain forever a distinct and inferior race, re- 
pugnant to our republican feelings and dangerous to our re- 
publican institutions. Free blacks are a greater nuisance 
than slaves themselves ; that is, generally speaking. There 
are many free blacks who are honorable, honest and en- 
lightened ; and for whom I entertain a sincere respect. Such 
of them as are otherwise, may justly ascribe it to their situ- 
ation. — We can make it their interest to remove." (C. 
C. Harper, Af. Repos. II. 188, 189.) A "free colored 
person has only a mockery of freedom here, and has 
turned his eyes to Africa, as his only resting place and 
refuge, in the deluge of oppression that surrounds him." 
(Idem, Af. Repos. III. p. 324.) And so Mr. Clay af- 
firms that the Colonization scheme does " provide effica- 
ciously for the total and absolute separation, by an ex- 
tensive space of water, or of land at least, of our popula- 
tion (i. e., the white,) from that which is free of the 
colored." {Af. Repos. VI. 12.) We do not question, 
therefore, the motives of the founders and supporters of 
Colonization, yet the fact is apparent — the principle of 
Colonization is, that the free people of color must remove 
because of the prejudice which oppresses them here. 
Not only is this proved by the admissions and statements 
of Colonizationists themselves, but it is conclusively de- 
monstrated by this fact, if the freemen who had once been 
slaves and their children changed their color with their 
condition, there would be no talk of their removal. In- 
deed, it has been asserted by some Southerners, that if 
all the slaves were white, they would be emancipated. 

Dr. Finley, indeed, for himself, and the class he rep- 
resented, tells us that the good to be accomplished 
by the Society was three-fold. " A three-fold benefit 
would arise. We should he cleared of them : (i. e. the free 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 17 

colored people ;) ice should send to Africa a population 
PARTLY civilized and Christianized, for its benefit; and our 
blacks themselves would be put in a belter situatio7i.'' {Af, 
Repos. I. 2.) Admitting that this most estimable man 
"meant well," we will be obh'ged in justice to acknowl- 
edge that he took for granted what we have characterized 
as the PRINCIPLE of colonization, viz. universal preju- 
dice, supposed to be incorrigible. He took, indeed, more 
than this for granted — even a debateable principle in each 
of his three specifications. Benevolence ought to have 
inquired first, whether, if human beings, (responsible in- 
telligences) were a "nuisance," they could not be con- 
verted into something better ; secondly, whether it would 
answer any very good purpose to Africa, to send thither 
those who were a nuisance here, and only ^pctr/Z?/ civilized 
and Christianized ; and thirdly, whether some better plan 
could not have been devised, by which " our blacks," (i. c. 
slaves,) at home, could be put in a better situation. 
By being "put in a better situation," we are willing to sup- 
pose HE meant, — having the circumstances of their slave 
condition somewhat ameliorated, and a possibility opened 
for their gradual emancipation : — results which he suppos- 
ed would be obtained by the removal of the free blacks, 
and the consequent increased feeling of security among the 
masters, leading them to treat their slaves with more len- 
ity if they persisted in keeping them in slavery. This 
they would of course do, if the scheme was feasible, be- 
cause the pretended right of property in slaves would not 
be touched, nor invaded in the least degree, but rather 
rendered safer. These were the views of Dr. Fin ley, 
who is sometimes claimed by the Colonization Society as 
its parent. The errors of his views are to be ascribed to 
the times, and the state of society, as it then was. The 
slave trade was then tolerated : why should we expect 
that even American clergymen, residing in slave States, 
would go in advance of the age 1 On this ground we ex- 
cuse him, but not many of his present followers. 

The views of Robert Finley were the avowed views of 



18 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

the Colonizalion Society at first ; ibis may be gathered 
from its own documents. The Society at first contemplat- 
ed all those objects which Dr. Finley mentioned. Thus 
its organ spoke. " Many seem to forget that this evil 
[slavery] can be diminished or removed only by the volun- 
tary consent of those who feel it, and that there exists and 
can be devised for it no instantaneous remedy. Our sym- 
pathy for the weak, must never render us unmindful of the 
interests of the powerful. On the supposition that the in- 
fluence of the Colonization Society is exclusively confined 
to the free colored people of our land, it is impossible for 
any man, not utterly indifferent to the welfare of two 
hundred and fifty thousand of his species, to oppose it. 
This object alone does the Colonization Society propose 
directly to effect." {Af. ReposAS25, 1. 226.) " If, how. 
ever, in its progress, it should exhibit the benefits which 
would accrue both to masters and slaves by a voluntary 
dissolution of the bonds which unite them ; should con- 
vince the southern people and their legislatures, that 
emancipation might be both safe, practicable, replete with 
blessings, and full of honor ; where, in this great repub- 
lic, is the candid Christian man who would regret the effect 
of its moral influence ? i. e. its influence to lead to eman- 
cipation, that the manumitted might be immediatMy colo- 
nized ; or rather, that they might be removed in order to 
be manumitted. {Af. Rep. I. 34.) " But is it not certain, 
that should the people of the Southern Stales refuse to 
adopt the opinions of the Colonization Society, and conti- 
nue to consider it both just and politic to leave untouched 
a system, for the termination of which we think the whole 
wisdom and energy of the States should be put in requisi- 
tion, that they will contribute more effectually to the con- 
tinuance and strength of this system, by removing those 
now free, than by any or all other methods which can pos- 
sibly be devised. Such has been the opinions expressed 
by Southern gentlemen of the first talents and distinction. 
In the decision of these individuals, as to the effects of the 
Colonization Society, we perceive no error in judgment ; 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 19 

our belief is the same as theirs." {Af. Rep. I. 227.) It 
appears, then, that from the very beginning of its career, 
the Colonization Society, having one distinct object direct- 
ly in view, aspired also to root out slavery by moral in- 
fluence ; and if it did not succeed in this way, owing to 
the attachment of slaveholders to their system, and could 
only accomplish its chief design, to remove the free, — the 
chains of the slave might then be more secure. This the 
Society avows. Yet at the same time it declares itself to 
those who desire the removal of slavery, " the only practi- 
cable method!^' But, in the name of common sense and 
all honesty, if you render the system of slavery more 
safe, do you not retard emancipation, and strengthen that 
system ? Indeed, even to this present day, can the Coloni- 
zation Society boast of its " moral influence ?" If we 
would correctly estimate this, we must look at the mass 
of the slaveholding population, not at particular and isolat- 
ed instances of generosity, which instances would all 
probably have occurred without the existence of the Colo- 
nization Society. What, then, has been its moral influ- 
ence ? Upon the slave laws ? Are they not now more 
severe than ever ! Have they not been growing worse 
year after year ! Upon slaveholders ? Are not manu- 
missions now almost an hundred times less frequent in 
proportion to the mass to be manumitted, than they were 
twenty years ago ! What, then, has its influence been ? 
But we are anticipating : — to return therefore, to the 
motives and views of the Colonization Society : — In the 
passage last quoted, is discovered the reason why the 
Colonization scheme was favored by individuals of emi- 
nence at the South, some of whom adopted one view of 
the Society's influence, and some another.* Even some 

* " The American Colonization Society has nothing to do with 
any man's opinion. It asks no man what he believes, it sets forth 
no confession of faith to be subscribed by its friends. Like the 
Bible Society, it liolds up the single definite work which it propoB- 
es to perform, and asks for nothing but co-operation. The only 
point of union which connects so many persons in that ' combina- 
tion,' as Mr. Garrison calls it, is this ; they all agree to co-operate 



20 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

of the strongest advocates for slavery and its perpetuity, 
united under the behef that the influence of the Society 
would strengthen their hands as slaveholders— these were 
in Georgia and South Carolina. In 1820, even Charles 
C. Pinckney of Charleston, who was afterwards so violent 
an enemy of the Society, contributed to its funds ; so did 
others with him to the amount of more than ^500. [Af, 
Rep. VI, 195.) At an earlier date the Society said, 
" some of our best and earliest friends reside in Georgia." 
(Af. Rep. II. 11.) A reaction indeed, then took place, 
{Af. Rep. V. 215 ;) the moral influence of the Society 
could not convert the hearts of slaveholders. And in 
Charleston a most bitter toned hostility has been current 
for many years. Pinckney denounced the object of the 
Society, as '' cruel and absurd," and the Charleston Mer- 
cury styles it — " murderous in its principles and as tend- 
ing inevitably to the destruction of the public peace ;" and 
asks, " Whether the general government," to which appli- 
cation had been made by the Society for aid, (and it is one 
of the avowed objects of the Society to obtain aid from 
government,) '- will become an instrument in the hands of 
fanaticism, and act the abettors of the incendiary and as- 
sassin." {Af. Repos. V. 196.) Numbers of the class 
of pro-slavery men have forsaken the Society from differ- 
ent motives — yet none of them because they quarrelled 
with the principle of Colonization — that the free colored 
people must go away. — The Colonization Society also as- 
serts in the labored defences of its policy, which from 
time to time it has found necessary to put forth, that it 

in promoting the Colonization of Africa, by the emigration of free 
people of color from America. Among them all, not one can be 
held responsible for the opinions, political or religious, of any other." 
(Chr, Spec. March, 1833, p. 148.) But to all this show of char- 
ity, it is sufficient to reply ; 1st, That if the Bible Society called 
into action wicked prejudices, it would be as deserving of condem- 
nation as the Colonization scheme. 2d. Every society is responsi- 
ble to the community for the influence it exerts upon that commu- 
nity. It is then a new begging of the question, to compare the 
Colonization Society with the American Bible Society. 



VIEWS ON COLONIZATION. 21 

has never yet changed its views and action. This we 
admit, knowing that the Society and its advocates still con- 
sider that principle to be correct. The Society indeed 
has always been cherished by those who indulge this 
feeling, and scarcely by any others. Nay, should the 
Society once relinquish this principle, it must inevitably 
die. 

There are are other motives which now influence Colo- 
nizationists in supporting the scheme. Some suppose 
that it will be a means of preventing the slave trade on 
the coast of Africa, by their founding colonies of those 
who are opposed to that trade. Perhaps it may have 
some influence in this way, yet it is very evident that a 
surer, and the only sure way of suppressing the slave 
trade, is to abolish all markets for human flesh. — Others 
suppose that the Colonization Society, as Dr. Finlcy ex- 
presses it, will benefit Africa, by planting a colony there 
of partly civilized and Christianized people. This they 
imagine will open a door for the introduction of the Gos- 
pel into that vast continent. This may be, in a very 
partial degree, the effect on Africa, yet what reasonable 
man can doubt that the most effectual method of propa- 
gating the Gospel is, by the preaching and teaching of 
men who are not engaged in the traffic with the ignorant 
natives to procure a subsistence or accumulate wealth. 
A commercial and trading colony is more likely to have 
the same effect on the uncivilized tribes of Africa, as the 
commercial and trading religious colonies of America 
have had upon our own aborigines. Indeed the acknow- 
ledgments of the Liberia Herald, the statements of intel- 
ligent colonists, and the small progress of civilization in 
and around the colony, not only would seem to destroy 
this imagination, but even furnish subject of ridicule 
against those who indulge it. At this present time (1839) 
are not Messrs. Wilson and Wynkoop, Missionaries of 
the A. B. C. F. M. obliged to renounce connection with 
the colony in order to obtain influence over the natives ? 
They are. 



22 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

Sec, 3. Is the Colonization Society/ entitled to the aid of 
the benevolent ? 

The Colonization Society asks to be tried, as to its 
principles and views, by the " Constitution of the Society, 
interpreted by the recorded opinions and by the acts of its 
founders.^'' {Af, Repos. VI. 197.) Unquestionably this 
is fair; and it is surely fair to consider the African Re- 
pository as expressing those views and principles. Let 
us give then the claims of the Society a fair trial. 

First, then, the Society cZa^ms the aid of the benevolent, 
to remove to Africa the free people of color, — 'vho are, 
they say, " The direst results of slavery." (R. J, 
Breckenridge, Af. Repos. IX. 327.) ^' Aliens, political, 
moral, social aliens.'^ {H. Clay, II. 327.) Nuisances. 
(C. C. Harper, II. 189.) " The most degraded and 

MOST ABANDONED RACE ON EARTH." (/. B. Havrison, 

III. 197.) *' Degraded in character and miserable 
in condition, forever excluded by public sentiment, by 
law and by a physical distinction, from the most power- 
ful motives to exertion.^' {Af, Repos, I. 34.) "J[ class 
introduced among us by violence, notoriously ignorant, de- 
graded and miserable, m.entally diseased, broken-spirited, 
acted on by no motives to honorable exertion, scarcely 
reached in their debasement by the heavenly light ; yet 
where is the sympathy and effort which a view of their 
condition ought to exert?" {Af. Repos. I. 48.) "An 

ANOMALOUS RACE OF BEINGS, THE MOST DEBASED UPON 

EARTH, who neither enjoy the blessings of freedom, nor are 
yet in the bonds of slavery — who hang as a vile excres- 
cence UPON SOCIETY." (C. L. Mosby, Af. Repos. VII. 
230.) •' The negro is no where more ignorant, no 

WHERE MORE DEBASED THAN HERE." (i?CU. Mr, BaCOn, 

New Haven, Af. Repos. I. 172.) — This is the people, 
at least thus characterized by the Society and its friends, 
whom the Society seeks to remove. 

That very many of the free colored population, are 
ignorant and vicious, and in a very degraded condition, 
cannot be denied. And with solemnity, and with better 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 23 

feelings than appear to have been indulged, when the query- 
was proposed above, we may ask, " Where is the sympa- 
thy and effort which a view of their condition ought to 
excite ?" Some justification may be found for some of 
the expressions above quoted, yet whether such assertions 
are literally true, after all, is more than questionable. It 
is supposed by many that they are more vicious than 
slaves, or than the lower class of whites, yet this may be 
denied. For even in Virginia, W. B. Giles, then 
Governor, declares that the free colored people of that 
State were freer from vice than either of the other 
classes.* And from the history of crimes so far as we 

« " In relation to the free people of crtlor, I am far from yield- 
ing to the opinion expressed by the intelligent committee of the 
House of Delegates of Virginia, and the enthusiastic memorialists 
of Powhatan, respecting the degraded and demoralized condition 
of this caste : at least in degree and extent. It will be admitted 
this caste of colored population, attract but little of the public sym. 
pathy and commisscration — in fact that the public feeling and sen. 
timent are opposed to it. It is also admitted that the penal laws 
against it have been marked with peculiar severity, so much so, as 
to form a characteristic to our whole penal code. When I first came 
into the office of Governor, such was the severity of the penal laws 
against that caste, that for all capital offences short of the punish- 
ment of death, and for many offences not capital, slavery, sale 
and transportation, formed the wretched doom denounced by the 
laws against the unfavored, despised caste of colored people. About, 
two years since, this extreme severity of punishmment was com- 
muted. — During the existence of these extreme punishments, up to 
the present period, the whole population of this description of peo- 
pie may be considered at the beginning, to be about 35,000, now 
mereased to about 40,000 in despite of all the efforts of the Colnni- 
zation Society, and notwithstanding the laws in favor of emigration 
and against immigration. During the existence of these extreme pun. 
ishments, the annual conviction for offences did not exceed eleven 
upon an increasing population of 35,000. Since the commutation of 
the punishment, the annual average of convicts upon the increased 
population of 40,000, is reduced to eis[ht. The proportion there- 
fore of the annual convictions, to the whole population, is as ] to 
5000, These facts serve to prove almost to a demonstration, 1st, 
That this class of population is by no means so degraded, vicious 
and demoralized, as represented by their prcijudiced friends and 
voluntary benefactors. And, 2d, That the evils attributed to this 
caste are vastly magnified and exaggerated." (Letter of W. B. 
Giles^ Governorof Va., to Lafayette,1829, 



24 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

have it, in the South, it does not appear that this class is 
" most vicious," as Mr. Clay asserts. {Af. Repos. II. 
343.) We have scarcely any data to estimate the com. 
parative viciousness of slaves, because masters tolerate 
vices in their slaves which they judge they cannot cure, — 
because slaves seldom have trials by law, — because mas- 
ters very frequently sell their slaves for the commission 
of petty offences. But we do not deny that many of the 
free colored people of the North are vicious and debased. 
The statistics of crime prove this. Nevertheless, in es- 
timating the comparative criminality of public offenders, 
their circumstances and their opportunities for obtaining 
information, must be taken into consideration. — But to 
pass on : these are the people whom the Colonization 
Society seeks to deport. It declares that here " they 
are under the foot of society" — and though society is 
regulated by Colonization influence, — it affects to believe 
that they can never be elevated in society or bettered in 
morals at home. It therefore holds out the hope that, if 
placed in a better situation, they would do better than 
they can be expected to do in this country. *' Here, " 
they say, " invincible prejudices exclude them from the 
enjoyment of the society of the whites, and deny to them 
all the advantages of freemen. The bar, the pulpit and 
our legislative halls are shut to them by the irresistible 
force of public sentiment. No talents however great, no 
piety however pure and devoted, no patriotism however 
ardent, can secure their admission." {Henry Clay, Af. 
Repos. VI. 17.) "If there is in the whole world a more 
wretched class of human beings than the people of color 
in this country, I do not know where they are to be 
found. They have no home, no country, no kindred, no 
friends. They are lazy and indolent, because they have 
no motives to prompt them." (J. A. Mc Kimieyy Af. 
Repos, "VI. 228.) — These exaggerated statements of both 
the worthlessness and degradation of the free colored 
people, ColonizatJonists have insisted on, to excite a feel- 
ing on the part of the citizens of the United States, which 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 25 

will dispose them to aid in their removal, and at the same 
time to lead the free colored people themselves to believe 
their situation so hopeless that it cannot he bettered here. 
But we may easily find in America, Europe, Asia, or 
Africa, " a more wretched class of human beings than 
the free people of color." If, as none will deny, very 
many of the latter are pious Christians, are they not less 
wretched than the heathen — whether lettered or unletter- 
ed, polite or barbarous, refined or clownish, — whose con- 
science is thoir enemy, and who are living without God 
and without hope in the world ? Indeed some Coloniza- 
tionists themselves admit that if they are most vicious, — 
•' it is the inevitable result of their moral, political, and 
civil degradation." {H. Clay, Af Repos., II. 343.) 
" the vices of this class do not spring from any inherent 
depravity in their natural constitution, but from their un- 
fortunate situation. So9ial intercourse is a want which 
we are prompted to gratify by all the properties of our 
nature. And as they cannot obtain it, in the better cir- 
cles of society, nor always among themselves, they resort 
to slaves, and to the most base and worthless of the 
whites. Corruption and all the train of petty offences 
are the consequences." {Idem. Af. Repos., VI. 18.) 
" While they continue here, subject to their peculiar temp- 
tations, and their perpetual depression beneath the foot of 
society, — [the latter being the cause of the former,] they 
can never be saved from the impoverishment and moral 
corruption, which with rare exceptions have, to the pre- 
sent hour, been their lot." {Address in North Carolina, 
Af. Repos., III. 66.) "Let them be maltreated ever so 
much, the law gives them no redress,* unless some white 
person happens to be present, to be a witness in the case." 
{Af. Repos, VI. 228.)— "This multitude of beings re. 
duced to that condition by our policy and social state." 
R.J. Breckenridge, Af Repos. VII. 171.) "They 
are the most abandoned race on earth. How came they 
thus? Alas, it is we, we who have first crushed all cheer- 

* The writer means, in the slave States — he is a Tennesscan. 
3 



26 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

ful hope of good to come, all taste for praise paid to vir- 
tue, by making them slaves ; have completed the work 
by throwing them out on a world, where we are vain 
enough to expect from them actions without motives, 
efforts where there is no spring — where the passive quali- 
ties bring contempt, and the active bring no honor, and 
where vice in its worst shapes, from indolence up to felony, 
is their shadow, their familiar, their tempter." (/. B. Har- 
rison, Af. Repos. III. 197.) 

I. Now, in answer to the supposed claim of the Soci- 
ety upon the benevolent, we ask, is it not strange that 
with all these acknowledgments, the only mode suggested 
and applauded by these gentlemen ; the only mode by 
which they propose to answer a " national sin," to pay 
" a deep debt to injured Africa !" to atone for injuries 
committed through prejudice ; is, by carrying out that 
prejudice into further action, to remove the injured far 
AWAY ? One would suppose that the first effort after con- 
fession would be to make reparation. This is the gospel 
rule : this is even the Mosaic institute. The reparation 
would consist in restoring to them all of which they have 
been unjustly deprived. Yet not one word of censure is 
to be found in this African Repository, as conducted by 
the Colonization Society — not one word of censure of 
those customs and manners and prejudices and laws of 
the whites, which produce all this degradation and misery. 
Nay, unjust and tyrannical laws are in a measure approv- 
ed. A deluge of oppression there is acknowledged to be, 
yet no barrier is placed in the way of that deluge. It 
rolls on still, without rebuke from the Colonization Soci- 
ety. There has not been formed, through Colonization 
influence south of the Potomac, nor in all the slave States, 
one solitary association for the protection of the free peo- 
pie of color. Colonizationists of the South admit that 
they are often kidnapped ; that they are not allowed to 
teach their children to read ; that their evidence in courts 
of justice is of no value ; — no matter how much some 
Colonizationists may " respect them," or how much they 



VIEWS ON COLONIZATION. 27 

may deserve respect, or how pious and upright they may 
be. Yet these wicked institutions, these miserable and 
contemptible prejudices, these infamous laws must be still 
tolerated and enforced, that the free colored people may 
:3ee and feel and be convinced that they cannot stay in 
this country. We find one Colonizationist who tells us 
that " Society is bound, and tliat now and always, to see 
that every man in it is fairly dealt by and justly paid by 
every other man in it ; and every human being is bound 
to do justice to every body." {R. J. Breckenridge, Af. 
Repos., IX. 329.) The same individual, while address- 
ing a Northern audience — declares slavery to he a sin ; 
and two other Colonizationists, Mr. Smith, then such, 
{Af, Repos. XI. 105,) and Mr. Young, {Af. Repos., XL 
120,) expressed the same opinion. Yet no where do we 
find Mr. Breckenridge, or his friends, entreating society to 
deal fairly and justly with all persons in it. Nay, this Ro- 
bert J. Breckenridge, this graphic delineator of the evils of 
slavery as a system of robbery, lust, barbarism and impiety, 
(see his essay Af. Repos. IX. 326 &;c.) even advances as 
an argument for Colonization the fact, that colored per- 
sons are driven from employment as draymen and drivers 
of hacks in Baltimore, in consequence of which many of 
them were on the verge of starvation. (Speech in Wash- 
mgton City, Feb. 1834.) We hear Colonizationists 
speaking thus in confession : — " we know that all of us 
have had our share in those institutions ; in the injustice 
and prejudice which have first brought the now free color- 
ed people to the degradation of slavery, and then bound 
them down to the 'baseness of ineffectual freedom.'" — 
" W^hether then we fear or loathe them, whether we feel 
compassion towards them, as a common feeling of human- 
ity, or compunction as to those we have injured, cruelly in- 
jured," — ( tken in repentance and reparation) — "we 

MUST ALL DESIRE TO 'JET RID OF THEM, and if possible, tO 

make better their condition thereby." (/. B. Harrison^ 
Af. Repos., III. 198.) Benevolent, truly ! Worthy of 
a Christian people and an enlightened age ! Again — 



28 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

♦* There are now (1826) at least five thousand free blacks 
in the city of Baltimore. We can make it their interest to 
remove. Every thing urges them to go. By their de- 
parture, thousands of places will be opened for our fellow 
citizens who are in want of employment. Into these va- 
cant places will immediately rush a white population. 
The blacks we can provide with a home on the coast of 
Africa, whence they originally came, and where they may 
become, after their long captivity and dispersion, a flour- 
ishing and enlightened people, and enjoy under our protec- 
tion those free institutions we have taught them to ad- 
mire." (C. C. Harper, Af Repos., II. 188.) This is 
the sin and the repentance of Colonizationism : Not, 
however, " new doctrine." It is coeval with Cain, and 
branched out both in Jew and Samaritan. This last ex* 
tract might furnish many topics for remark — and to a 
Christian mind cannot but provide, on a careful perusal, 
abundant subject of painful thought. I beg the reader to 
ponder it, in view of eternity. He will see plainly con- 
fessed, some of the most selfish and unjustifiable motives 
which can regulate the human mind. Pray, we might 
ask, HOW have you taught the colored people " to ad- 
mire YOUR FREE INSTITUTIONS ?" As slavcs, by Crushing 
them, oppressing them, chastising them for no crime, cor- 
rupting them and brutalizing them ? Or as free people, 
by their " constant depression beneath the foot of 
SOCIETY ?" Reason, justice, nature, religion, God will 
say, " out of your own mouths will I condemn you." 

It is strange that an appeal is constantly made to 
the Christian public, both in America and Great Bri- 
tain, to aid in a project which is so wanting in the 
first elements of Gospel charity. If indeed the Colo, 
nization scheme proposed to colonize or concentrate on 
the coasts of Africa the wandering tribes, to teach them 
the arts and sciences, and the duties of civilized life, 
to give them all the "free institutions" of this mis- 
named free land, and to form stations whence mission- 
aries and teachers under the guidance of other associa^ 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 29 

tions might go forth to teach and instruct the natives in 
morals or reHgion or science ; it might be a society com- 
mercial or political, or what it pleased, and allied to the 
benevolent operations of the age. Yet even under such 
an organization, and with such objects in view, it would 
have little claim upon the benevolent citizens of the United 
States, at least no right to call for their aid in this work, 
upon lis oicn plea. But while it gratifies that prejudice 
which has so long crushed the colored race in this land, 
nay, while it is the present chief means of keeping up that 
prejudice which has been the principal cause of their de- 
gradation and oppression, it has no such claim. Much 
less has it a claim, than if it were merely a commercial 
or trading corporation. It is guilty of felony and sacri- 
lege in thus demanding and perverting, as it does, the con- 
tributions of the benevolent, obtained by unsubstantial pre- 
tences, and thus gratifying prejudice at an enormous ex- 
pense to the American churches. 

II. But the Colonization Society cannot claim the cha- 
racter of a benevolent association, because it does not take 
the proper course in regard to slavery itself. When vice 
and misery are to be weighed, and the perpetrators con- 
victed and sentenced, what is the weight of a feather at 
the fulcrum of the beam ? Such is the value of Coloniza- 
tionism in regard to the sin of slavery. It speaks not 
against it, as becomes a benevolent society. By its ac- 
tion it rather encourages the slaveholder than condemns 
him. It excuses his conduct. Is this consistent with that 
claim which it obtrudes upon us continually ? — Once the 
writer was a Colonizationist. He served the Society as 
an agent, repelled its gainsayers, and endeavored to ad- 
vance its schemes both in the South and in the North, 
(See Af. Repos., III. 349, 371, 378 ; IV. 64, 254.) but 
this was while he did not believe slavery to be a sin : for 
he was born and reared in a slave country (in Washing- 
ton City,) his relatives are most of them slaveholders ; and 
the principle of Colonization he then considered just. 
He lumped together the "political and moral evils of 
3* 



30 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

slavery" as the contingent rather than the necessary con- 
comitants of slavery itself. Indeed it is wonderful that 
any one can be a Colonizationist and yet believe slavery 
sinful ; and think himself benevolent or acting under the 
impulses of benevolence, when he aids a Society which 
has not moral courage enough to rebuke a system acknow- 
ledged to be one of " robbery, lust, barbarism and im- 
piety," legalized. Would any rational being reason in 
regard to any other sinful system, as Colonizationists do 
of slavery ? If in the higher circles of Baltimore for in- 
stance, adultery were practised openly without shame, 
would the exposure of such a sin, and its prohibition by 
severe enactments, and its abolition attended by the break- 
ing up of all criminal connections which had been formed 
for its commission, be productive of more evil than good ? 
Impossible. Yet this is the sort of plea which the benevo- 
lent Colonization Society urges in support of slavery — the 
present infamous system of American slavery, with all its 
accompanying injuries to the free colored people ! This 
is the almost uniform plea ; North, South, East and West 
it is reiterated. Strange that a benevolent society should 
leave unrebuked a system of sin, which is causing those 
very evils it professes to labor to remove. Nay, stranger 
still, that in its appeals to the benevolent, the society- 
should urge its claim upon the very ground that it does not 
oppose slavery in a direct manner : i» e. that it neglects 
the first duties of humanity.* 

III. Can that he true benevolence which is directed only by 
prejudice ? In the Colonization scheme, there is no re- 
pentance for sin, no heart-breaking for that which is con- 
fessedly "against reason" and not justified by the gos- 
pel. On the contrary, there is a constant exercise of the 

* " Should the Society presume to touch the rights of individu- 
als over the persons of their slaves, its influence would perish. It 
would at once be denied access to any slavcholding State." (Rev. 
W. W. Atkinson, Af. Repos., XI. 49.) It may be observed also 
in this connection, that Colonizationists impose upon the northern 
community by mitigated statements of the condition of slaves. See 
e. g. : G. P. Disosway's Oration, Newark, N. J., July 4, 1831. 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 31 

sinful prejudice. Is this consistent with the rules of 
Christ ? Does it coincide with the precept derived from 
the conduct of the good Samaritan ? Let us hear the ad- 
mission of an eminent gentleman, who at the time he wrote 
it was a Colonizationist, and was altogether the most mu- 
nificent and spirited patron of the Society. Hear what 
he says in respect to this prejudice. — The Colonization 
Society is opposed on the ground that *'its members are 
prejudiced against the free colored people of this country. 
I admit that they are thus prejudiced — wickedly preju- 
diced. But is this prejudice peculiar to them ? have they 
more of it than their countrymen generally have ? — In that 
heartless and calculating policy, which we see has soiled 
the pure benevolence of its original character and earliest 
years, the Society is the guilty cause of encouraging the 
popular undervaluation and scorn of the man of color." 
(Af. Repos. XI. 71, 72.) We believe, however, that the 
benevolence of the Colonization scheme is the same it 
ever was- Its foundation stone was and continues to be 
prejudice. We do not say, that all which Colonization, 
ists have done for the colored people, is in consequence 
of all its members indulging prejudice and only prejudice 
at all times towards the colored population ; but we do af- 
firm, what Colonizationists admit, that their " benevo- 
lent" scheme would not exist, be acted upon, or continue, 
were it not for this old and present and unreasonable pre- 
judice. It resembles the benevolence of reconcilea bro- 
thers, who having been long at variance can correspond 
at a distance, call themselves " brethren," but cannot 
• bear to look each other in the face. They may agree 
perhaps to see each other without prejudice on a death- 
bed, in view of eternity, and fondly hope that there shall 
be no prejudice in their minds by and by. Such a recon- 
ciliation furnishes matters of repentance in the hour of 
death. Admitting that the free colored people were all 
that the Colonization Society tells us they are — vicious 
and degraded most of all, does that justify the organizing 
of an association for their removal ? Why not labor to 



32 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

convert them at home ? especially since it is admitted 
that they are rendered vicious and debased, and continued 
so by the operation of prejudice? Or if vice and degrada- 
tion are just causes of removal, why not organize associa- 
tions to transport and expatriate to some point on the Afri- 
can coast, WHITE nuisances" — thieves, manstealers, forni- 
cators, adulterers, and abandoned men and women ? This 
would be as benevolent as to carry away colored men of 
the same character. The former deserve transportation 
as much as the latter. If society requires the removal of 
the one, how can it dispense with that of the other ? But 
when we remember that in truth the alleged necessity of 
removal is, in the case of the colored people, a mere crea- 
ture of a prejudice irrational and wicked, and that each 
removal, though it may produce a kind of relief for the 
individual exile, is destitute of any tendency to subdue, 
but rather operates to deepen and confirm that prejudice 
which expelled him, and at the same time to rivet new 
chains on his brethren, both bond and free, who are left 
behind ; what then shall we say of the benevolence of the 
expatriating scheme ? 

IV. But can the Colonization Society be considered a 
benevolent scheme, since from its very commencement to 
the present time, it has opposed all emancipation, and the 
abolition of slavery in the United States, except in its own 
WAY ; i. e. by a very gradual process accompanied by 
the colonizing of the liberated : and has presented no plea 
and professed no desire for manumission, or for the edu- 
cation of colored persons, on any other ground ? " It is 
in nowise allied to any abolition society in America, or 
elsewhere, and is ready, whenever there is need, to pass a 
censure upon such societies in America." (/. B. Harris 
son, Af. Repos., III. 203.) " To these, the Colonization 
Society would say, your object is unttainable, your zeal 
dangerous, and nothing can give it a right direction or a 
right temperature, but your surrendering your plan to 
ours." (Idem, III. 203.) " Let the abolitionist give up 
liis cause, as impossible of execution, hateful to the com 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 33 

munity, ruinous to the cause of the blacks, and founded 
upon principles wrong in themselves." {R, J. Brecken. 
■ridge, Af. Repos., IX. 331.) "With the enthusiasts of 
the North, I embark not in the wild and destructive 
scheme, which calls on the South for immediate and uni- 
versal emancipation." {R. F. Stockton, Af. Repos., I. 13.) 
" So frequent were manumissions in Maryland and Vir- 
ginia, before counteracted by legal preventions, as to 
throw upon the public an immense mass of wretched peo- 
ple." {Editorial, Af. Repos. I. 162.) "The inconve- 
nience and danger of multiplying their number [i. e. of 
free colored persons] where slavery exists at all." (C 
F. Mercer, Af. Repos. IV. 53.) " This law (the law 
forbidding emancipated persons to remain in Virginia 
longer than a year after emancipatio ,) odious and unjust 
as it may at first view appear, and hard as it may seem to 
bear upon the liberated negro, was doubtless dictated by 
sound policy ; and its repeal would be regarded by none 
with more unfeigned regret than by the friends of African 
colonization. It has restrained many masters from giving 
freedom to their slaves, and has thereby contributed to 
check the growth of an evil already too great and formida- 
ble." (Memorial to Virginia Legislature, Af. Repos., V. 
20, 21.) " Its members are sustaining the wise policy of 
the law of Virginia, forbidding slaves emancipated since 
May, 1806, to reside within the State." {Lynchburg Col, 
Soc, Af. Repos., V. 241.) "Whatever abolition may 
have done heretofore, in the States now free, it had done 
nothing and could do nothing in the slave States for the 
cause of humanity." {F. S. Key, Af. Repos., V. 364.) 
" Emancipation with the liberated to remain on this side 
of the Atlantic, is but an act of dreamy madness." (G, 
W. P. Custis, Af. Repos., V. 306.) " If the question 
were submitted, whether there should be either immediate 
or gradual emancipation of all the slaves in the United 
States without their removal or colonization, painful as it 
is to express the opinion, I have no doubt it would be un- 
wise to emancipate them." (H. Clay, Af. Repos., VI. 5.) 



34 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

" A sense of their own safety required the painful prohi- 
bition." {Idem, 2d An. Report, 110.) " We would say, 
liberate them only on condition of their going to Africa or 
Hayti." {Af. Repos., III. 26, quoted from an Indiana 
paper.) 

These are the sentiments of colonizationists generally, 
and hence the Society has constantly made an effort to en- 
gross the favor of the public, both by direct appeals to 
its prejudices, to its fears and its benevolence, and by 
open opposition to abolitionists. The friends of the So- 
ciety also boast of their success ; " that the friends of colo. 
nization have done more in twelve years for the black 
race than the abolitionists have done for twelve centu- 
ries." (R. J. Breckenridge, Af. Repos., IX. 328.) 
This last assertion is palpably erroneous, yet so great is 
the hallucination of some, that they believe it. We ask, 
however, can that institution which opposes the pulling 
down of such a system of sin, as American slavery, be 
called a benevolent society; especially since it opposes 
with a fiery zeal, those very plans which have been else- 
where successful in destroying that system ? Many of its 
members admit that if ever the Colonization Society suc- 
ceeds, it can only be in the course of a " century" or cen- 
turies. {Af. Repos., V. 367.) Thus then, all the evils of 
slavery are to be continued for a century, that the Coloniza- 
tion Society may have a fair trial to succeed. 

V. Lastly, can that Society be entitled to the aid of 
the benevolent, which misrepresents and slanders those 
who are in this country, opposing slavery as a sin ? Since 
the excitement began in our country, the Colonization 
Society seems to have taken pains by every possible 
method to prevent those persons who are more imme- 
diately interested in the abolition of slavery, from be- 
coming acquainted with the true views and motives of abo- 
litionists. It is to this that the excitement may be 
chiefly ascribed. The Colonizationists having engrossed 
the public attention in the South, by the clamor which, in 
connection with the defenders of slavery in the abstract, 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 35 

they have raised against the abolitionists, have alntiost 
entirely prevented the latter from being heard. The 
Society, encouraged by almost all Colonizationists, has even 
taunted the abolition isis with cowardice, after, having suc- 
ceeded in rendering them unjustly odious. " He is a 
cowardly soldier, says a Colonization orator, who gets 
beyond the reach of his adversary before he fires his gun. 
Why do not these anti -slavery lecturers come among us, 
who are so enveloped in darkness and guilt, and point out 
to us our iniquity and our danger, our duty and the man- 
ner in which we may perform it." {Af, Repos., XI. 227.) 
This bravado is repeated, when the Society knows that, — 
principally owing to her false representations — an abo 
litionist's life would be forfeited, if he went into the South 
to explain his views and propose that plan for the remov- 
al of slavery which he believes safe, practicable and hap- 
py for all concerned. Colonizationists generally have 
united in the slanderous cry, against the abolitionists, of 
"incendiarism, fanaticism, &c." The Society charges 
them with lying {Af. Repos.^ XI. 274) ; condescends in 
the fervor of zeal for abolition in its own icay, to record 
with approbation that a check was given to abolition in 
Kentucky {Af, Repos., XI. 285) ; charges the abolition- 
ists with producing *' an excitement deplored by every 
friend of the constitution ;" and has even given the sanc- 
tion of its name to the proposition to prevent the press in 
the North from speaking about slavery. Eminent 
Colonizationists, such as Mr. Clay, Mr. Key and Mr. 
Everett, (Governor of Massachusetts,) have recommend- 
ed legislation against abolitionists.* 

♦Colonizationists, governed as they admit by prejudice, have 
recommended both civil and ecclesiastical legislation against 
abolitionists : e. g. Gov. Everett, of Massachusetts ; Gov. Wolf, of 
Pennsylvania ; 3Tr. Clay, of Kentucky — (at the annual meeting 
of Colonization Society, Dec 1835, — Washington City ; Mr. Key, 
prosecuting attorney of the District of Columbia, (see the trial of 
Dr. Crandall in which Mr. Key labored hard to convict Dr. Cran- 
dall of doing and saying what he had himself said, making it 
evident, as was affirmed by the lawyers at the trial, that the whole 



36 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

To judge of the truth and virtue of the Society, let any- 
one read the African Repository for October 1835, (Vol. 
XI.) — a document set forth by a benevolent society ! — It 
must be edifying to benevolent Colonizationists to com- 
pare the sentiments of the Society, with those uttered 
about the same time by an advocate for slavery in the ab- 
stract — whom Colonizationists pronounce " odious in 
thought," " We are of those who believe the South has 
nothing to fear from a servile war. We do not believe 
the abolitionists intended, nor could they if they would, 
excite the slaves to insurrection. The danger of this is 
remote. We believe we have most to fear from the 
organized action upon the consciences and fears of the 
slaveholders themselves — from the insinuations of the 
dangerous heresies* into our schools and pulpits and do- 
mestics circles." {United States Telegraphy November 
24th, 1835.) 

Alas ? that this " great and benevolent " institution 
should thus stand reproved, and convicted of slander, by 
a defender of slavery as right in itself; as being " the 
best existing organization of civil society." The Colon- 
ization Society knows that the abolitionists deprecate a 
servile insurrection, that they abhor the thought of 
slave murderers, 6z;c.,yetshe bears false witness against 
them to the South. Where is the benevolence of this 
scheme which resorts even to falsehood for its support ? 

was a contest of the Colonization Society with the abolitionists ); 
Rev. Mr. Bacon, of New Haven, an eminent Colonizationist intro- 
duced the resolutions which were adopted by the general associa- 
tions of Connecticut and Massachusetts — the evident design of 
the mover being to shut out from a hearing the agents of the 
American Anti-Slavery Society. — Colonizationists have rendered 
that treatment to the abolitionists, of which in the early life of the 
Colonization Society, itself so much complained. (See Vol. I. 
and II. and VII. 99. of Af. Repos.) 

* '* Dnrigerous heresies," i. e. the doctrine that slavery is a sin, 
and an evil ; for the editor avows his belief of the propriety of 
slavery and of its continuance. — He and his friends take consis- 
tent giuund, at least. 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 37 



CHAPTER II. 

DOES THE COLONIZATION SOCIETY PURSUE A REASONABLE 
AND JUDICIOUS COURSE ? — IS ITS SCHEME PRACTICABLE ? — 
IS THE SOCIETr NECESSARY? — CONCLUDING REMARKS ; 
WM. JAY AND DR. REESE. 

A certain mode of feeling is generated, of the utter unreason- 
ableness of which " the mind is dimly conscious, and to rid itself 
of the uneasy sense of being absurd, rushes on towards sentiments 
still more absurd, that by their aid it may quite surround itself 
with false impressions, and lose all recollection of calm truths." 
(Fanaticism, p. 23.) 

Section 1 . — Is the course of the Society judicious ? 

Secondly. — It is proposed by the Colonization Socie- 
ty, to colonize free colored persons, either those who 
are already free, or those who may be put into its hands 
to be colonized that they may be free ; and thus to colo- 
nize all. And the society, pleading that its plan is reas- 
onable and proper, here advances another claim for aid. 

1. To colonize those toko are already free. The So- 
ciety must necessarily, if it would not destroy its colony, 
send out emigrants of good moral character. Hence it 
labors to induce the best of those who are among us, to 
emigrate. This operation pursued extensively is not 
salutary in its influence upon the free colored people as 
a body. We shall not dwell upon the strange inconsis- 
tency of sending out " nuisances," or, persons " j)artly 
civilized and Christianized^^ to Christianize them in 
Africa, and through them to civilize and Christianize 
Africa it.self — a point on which the Colonization Society 
has opened itself to a charge ; but we will admit that 
the Society has ever been desirous of sending out " se- 
lect emigrants." It picks out, then, the sound limbs of a 
corrupted and corrupting body, as it says, and deports 
them to a more congenial soil. So doing, the Society is 
constantly aggravating the evil at home. This is the 
necessary, legitimate result. Suppose, for instance, that 
of the five thousand free colored people in the city of 
4 



38 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

Baltimore, in 1826, the portion which exerted a whole- 
some influence on the entire mass, — the " some " who 
were entitled to the " respect" of Mr. Harper, — amount- 
ed to one hundred ; while the whole were separated by 
an " insurmountable barrier from the whites," and the 
great majority of them of little moral worth, " degraded 
and miserable." Would not the abduction of the influ- 
ence exerted by the respectable and various hundred, be 
soon felt ? — felt not only on the colored mass, but on 
the whole of society 1 Nay, would not the departure of 
one fourth part, or one-tenth part of those who constitute 
a good leaven, aflect injuriously the entire community ? 
It would be just as reasonable to draw a sound tooth from 
a jaw in which almost all are decayed, as to remove an 
educated and virtuous person from an ignorant and de- 
graded community. Such removals always have exert- 
ed and always will exert an evil influence upon the 
portion remaining at home. It is very questionable 
whether our cities and our country in general, are pur- 
suing a policy, in this particular, which will tend to se- 
cure public order, tranquillity, sobriety and good morals. 
The emigration of the better class of colored people 
from Philadelphia and New York, would be an event 
much to be deplored. And, in Hie South, take the case of 
those three individuals, whose exclusion from the right of 
voting, by the new constitution of North Carolina, oc- 
casioned expressions of public regret. [John C. Stan- 
ley of Newborn, Lewis Sheridan of Bladen, now in Li. 
beria, and Jo7ies of Raleigh. See the North Carolina 
papers, about the time of the adoption of the present 
Constitution of North Carolina.) Such men in their 
connection with colored people, serve as a moral res- 
traint on them, and as a safe-guard to the whites in case 
the slaves should make or meditate trouble. Their ex- 
ample and conduct altogether was and is known to be 
admirable. The writer has seen and conversed with 
many individuals in the South, whose expatriation it 
would be wise in the slaveholding community to oppose. 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 39 

If the Colonization Society should gain its object and 
induce the better class of free colored persons to re- 
move to Liberia, not only would the whole as a body 
deteriorate, but a large portion of the white population 
would deteriorate with them. And this deterioration 
would })rogress in proportion to the success which would 
attend the Society. This is a matter of serious regret, 
if not of alarm. 

It may be said ' if the best go first, the rest will follow.' 
But will they do so voluntarily 1 We cannot compel them. 
That would be, not Colonization, but expatriation and 
the deportation of felons. Or suppose they will go, either 
of their own accord or by compulsion. Will the Coloni- 
zation Society take them ? Will it not deprecate their 
going? Will the colonists receive them? Will they 
not be obliged eventually to lay a prohibition on the im- 
portation of such persons ? If they should shut their 
ports against an influx of the refuse of the population of 
this land, what then shall we do ? Wait a " century" 
again before another place could be within reach ! — It is 
very probable, not to say certain, that as the colony ad- 
vances in improvement, a regard to their own welfare 
will induce the colonists to adopt some such measure for 
self-defence. Else there is much reason to fear their 
boasted privileges will all be good for nothing. Has the 
public forgotten the influence upon the colony at Liberia, 
of the two " cargoes of vagabonds," which Mr. Brecken- 
ridge says were " coerced away from Virginia, as truly 
as if it had been done with a cart whip." (Speech, Feb. 
1834.*) The colony has not forgotten it. The Society 

* In the discussion of the Colonization question in Glasgow, 
Scotland, Mr. Breckenridge says this is an " unfair report ;" and 
charges the editor of the Evangelist with giving it '' to serve a 
special purpose." Such an assertion implicating the character of 
Mr. Leavitt is as base as it is unfounded. The New York Observer, 
Feb. 15, 1834, gives the passage thus — " experience has made us 
cautious how we connive at the transportation to Africa, as heralds 
of civilization and religion, of free vagabonds, coerced away against 
their will, by the concentrated virulence of public odium, as really 



40 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

has not forgotten it ; and with good reason does she yet 
remember it. It had nearly ruined the colony, and the 
Society too. But if " two cargoes" could produce such 
mischief in 1832, what will not twenty or fifty in 1932 ? 
The Board of Managers have not forgotten the oversight 
they committed, and for which they were severely berated 
by some of their best friends ; and having learned wisdom 
by experience, they will be very careful in future. The 
Southampton massacre was the leading cause of driving 
off those wretched people. Some of them were whipped 
to make them willing to go. This, as Mr. Breckenridge 
says, was "the concentrated virulence of public odium." 
(N. Y. Observer, Feb. 15, 1834.) Should such troubles 
again occur, as they will, if slavery continues, what will 
the Society do ? Confess its incompetency, refuse a pass- 
port to the miserable " outcasts" who may be coerced 
under similar circumstances, (thus tempting the southern 
people to transport them themselves, and of their own ac- 
cord to make Liberia a Botany Bay,) or again jeopardize 
their own existence and the happiness of every colonist, 
by receiving all who will come or be sent, whatever may 
be their moral character ? 

The society recovered from the shock, but it has now 
confessedly relinquished the hope of building up the colo- 
ny from the free colored people. It looks to the slave- 
holders of the South, and informs us that many masters 
through the kindly influence of the Society, are willing to 
liberate their slaves on condhion of their going to Liberia. 
The Society is beginning to see that the free colored 
people generally are hostile to its designs, and will not 
go under its auspices. (See R. J. Breckenridge's Speech, 
February, 1834.) And we are glad of it. Not only have 
the free colored people already been injured by the ab- 
duction of the influence of men whom the Colonization 
Society transported, but some of those men, had they re- 

as if they were manacled and carried away beneath the hatches." 
Is there here any essential difference ? Doubtless Mr. B. knew they 
were whipped to make them willing to go. — Compare Broadnax's 
Speech, in Va. House of Delegates. Jay's Enq. p. 52. 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 41 

mained at home, would have given less ambiguous proof 
of good moral character. If then the society adheres to 
its professed determination to remove none but those of 
good character, how is it ever to benefit the free colored 
people in general ? — or if it eventually departs from this, 
how is it ever to build up a Christian society there ? Or 
what security can the Society give, that as soon as the co- 
lonists have reached that stage of improvement which will 
give them universally a knowledge of their strength and 
their rights — they will not be unwilling to jeopardize their 
own security and happiness by admitting all sorts of per- 
sons 1 Will they not feel equal jealousy against the intro- 
duction of those of their own color who are unlettered 
and vicious, which is so extensively felt in this country 
against foreign emigrants and paupers ? 

2. The Colonization Society will deport those who may 
be liberated for this purpose ; or more correctly, will take 
away those who may be entrusted to it for the 'purpose of 
transporting, them that they may he free in Africa. What 
does a man prize dearer than freedom ? " We utter the 
common sentiment of mankind, when we say, none ever 
continue a moment slaves, after they are conscious of their 
ability to retrieve their freedom." (R. J. Breckenridge, 
Af Repos., IX. 326.) Yet some have been offered their 
freedom, upon condition of their going to Liberia, and have 
preferred bondage to such freedom. Had it indeed been 
proved to their conviction, that freedom would have been 
happily secured to them in Africa ; had it not been " mat- 
ter of conjecture or calculation," they would probably 
have gone. Hundreds, however, of these ignorant and 
unfortunate slaves have been sent out, whether willing or 
unwilling, and many others are offered to the Society. 
But if these alone are the inhabitants of a colony, it is 
doubtful whether their literary and moral state will for a 
time be much removed from barbarism, though they may 
have been taught a sort of Tantalus-like* admiration of 

* Tantalus is represented by the heathen poets as punished in 
hell, with an insatiable thirst, and placed up to his chin in a pool 
4* 



42 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

" our free institutions." The Society sends, say forty, 
from one plantation, the master of which had all at once 
become convinced that it was wrong to keep human beings 
as properly. Some of these are worthless, degraded and 
injurious. None, or very few, ca.n read. In the co- 
lony they must learn the elements of education.* If, as some 
say, they are incapable of learning here, will crossing the 
ocean sharpen their natural wit ? Rather will they not 
find the same motives there operating, which would have 
operated here, had these unfortunate beings been liberated 
and kindly dealt with ? The same reasons which render 
it desirable they should be instructed in Africa, make it 
desirable they should be instructed here. But, passing 
this by, some of these forty may be religious persons, but 
without knowledge to guide them. And is it likely that 
in a colony, where preachers are merchants, and the poor 
slave first begins to breathe free air ; where " the world" 
is rushing upon him, and cares burdening him ; is it like- 
ly that he will vastly improve ? The inevitable conse- 
quence of huddling together ignorant persons, is a per- 
petuation of ignorance with its attendant evils. — The "in- 
creased severity of the slave code," while it may prove a 
part of the moral influence of the Colonization Society, 
(as was said by an eminent V. P. of the Col. Society,) 
will nevertheless be a great barrier in the way of its suc- 
cess. This has already been shown in some considerable 
degree. Hence the deplored evils of ignorance and idle- 

of water, which flows away as soon as he attempts to taste it. A 
bough richly loaded with delicious fruit hangs above his head, 
which as soon as he attempts to seize is driven out of his reach by 
a sudden gust of wind. If this were not fable, we should deem it 
almost prophetic, and that an American slave had sat for the pic- 
ture. Poor slave, how does he admire the water and the fruit ! — 
the " free institutions" of C. C. Harper; or the benevolence of 
Colonizationism ! 

* In April, 1830, the Rev. Geo. M. Erskine thus addressed the 
Secretary of the Am. Col. Society. " Sir, the state of things with 
regard to schools, is truly lamentable. The only school in the colo. 
ny at this time is a remnant of one at the Cape. Among the pre- 
sent emigrants, there are seventeen out of forty-eight that can 
lead.— (Af. Rep. VI. 121.) 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 43 

ness in the colony :* hence the fact that even preachers 
in the colony, men whom we might suppose to know the 
sweets of freedom, and whom we should expect to be 
virtuous, acted so " nefariously," when the colony was in 
distress, " as to charge the Society three or four hundred 
per cent, on articles for the use of the poor, and for the 
support of the colony. (R. J. Breckenridge's Speech, 
Feb. 1834.) In this view, how just are the observations 
of Professor Silliman. " It will be as much as they can 
do to manage the slaves who are emancipated on condi- 
tion of immediate emigration, and who must therefore be 
received as they are : but it is most obvious that no African 
colony can flourish, which does not contain a good pro- 
portion of religious, moral, and instructed men : men who 
have some acquaintance with business, and with useful 
arts and trades, and who are qualified to manage the con- 
cerns of a recent and immature community." Af. Repos., 
VIII. 174.) We would therefore remind the Coloniza- 
tion Society, and the Southerners generally, that, admitting 
as some of them say, these deported slaves are " fit for 
freedom," the slaves thus fitted are not the persons whom 
they ought to deport. If they are prepared for freedom 
by good moral habits, and established virtue, they are 
all needed at home. Southerners should beware how 
they send off the best they have. Of the whole colored 

* The African Repository, may in one view be styled the Colo- 
nial Thermometer. Now, we have flattering accounts of the pros- 
perity, the agriculture, &c. of the African settlements ; anon, we 
are affected with lugubrious lamentations over the absence of these 
very things. These alternations return at about regular intervals. 
The colony is thus invested with an hermaphrodite character, and, 
like the scheme itself, is " not to be managed on any one set of 
PRINCIPLES." (Speech of R. J. Breckenridge. Pliiladelphia, May 
1838.) Let us believe, therefore, the Af. Rep., Col. Herald, .Soc, 
and we arrive at the following safe conclusion, the colony is 
prospering, — it is not prospering. The colony is advancing in 
education, — it is not advancing. The Colonists are agriculturalists 
— they are not agriculturalists. Now all this is consistent with no- 
thing else but " the scheme"— which \z only a second Janus, in 
its physiognomy. 



44 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

population, the best ought not to be sent, and the rest tlie 
Society will not take. 

Sec. '^. — Is the Colonization Society <idequate to the task 
it has undertaken. 
Thirdly. — -The Colonization Society proposes its 
scheme as practicable, and sufficient to meet the evils 
complained of. We ask, then, in the third place, is it 
capable of accomplishing the task it has entered upon — 
viz : to rid the United States of slavery ? I do not affirm 
that the Society avows in its constitution, that it is the 
only practicable method of destroying the deadly curse 
of slavery in the United Slates : but it is apparent that 
many intelligent Colonizationists indulge this hope, and 
avow it. Nay, if this were not the case, no reason can 
be assigned why so much bitter opposition should be 
manifested by the Society and Colonizationists gene- 
rally, against all other efforts to remove slavery, by 
those who are not Colonizationists. That Colonization, 
ists indulge this hope is evident also from the fact that 
while they oppose every other plan but their own, they 
still express the hope that the United States will be de- 
livered from slavery, and in connection with this hope 
still continue their operations in opposition to uncondition- 
al emancipation.* 

* Dr. Reese in his letters to Mr. Jay, pp. 4, 5, flatly denies that 
the Colonization Society esteems itself the only remedy for sla- 
very, yet this is asserted by those who are as well entitled to credit 
as himself. Thus, Mr. Gerrit Smith, (then a Colonizationist,) 
says : " we find the Society, setting itself up not only as the 
exclusive fit means of promoting the interests of our free color- 
ed population, but even as the only means which could be right- 
fully employed to deliver this land from the curse of slavery," 
&c. (J,/. Repos., XL 70.) See the passages quoted above, chap. 
I., beginning of section second, or the Repository generally : e. g. 
IV. 368 ; III. 197 ; III. 355 •, III. 66 ; IV. 299 ; IX. 331 ; II. 
188 ; VIII. 172 ; V. 366 ; particularly the whole of Mr. Smith's 
observations, XI. 70. Dr. Reese admits, p. 5, that it would be 
" arrogance" in the Colonization Society to assume this ground, 
while ho declares that it would be " utterly absurd to suppose 
that the allegation can have any foundation in truth," This reck- 
less and unsustained assertion is but a specimen of Dr. Reese's 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 45 

I. Let us now meet the question. Is the Coloniza- 
lion scheme adequate to this task it has undertaken ? 
There are now in the United States, upwards of 2,5005- 
000 slaves, or more than 3,000,000 of colored persons, 
slave and free. " Their annual increase, from 1830 to 
1840, will not be very much from 80,000 a year." {R. 
J. Breckcnridge, Kl Repos., IX. 331.) "In 1840," 
Matthew Carey savs " they will amount to 3,045,504, in 
1870, to 7,500,000 nearly." The Christian Spectator 
says " their number doubles in less then 20 years : things 
remaining as they now are, we shall have in 1830, 
12,000,000 of slaves." (CA. Spectator, 1823.) By the low- 
est calculation, unless some unforeseen calamity occurs, 
to arrest the increase, there will be, in 1940, " a century" 
hence, 100,000,000 of colored persons in the present 
national limits of our territory. The colonization 
scheme, whether the present number of the colored 
people, or their probable number in years future be con- 
sidered, proposes to remove millions of people to a foreign 
land, or to induce them to remove themselves, i. e. by keep- 
ing up and strengthening the existing prejudice against 
color, to " make it their interest to remove." But during 
the more than twenty years in which the Society has been 
in operation, it has not removed over the present increase 
OF THREE WEEKS ! Yet the Society boasts of its suc- 
cess, and of the rapidly increasing strength of the colo- 
ny at Liberia! Nevertheless, on the admission of 
colonizationists themselves, not two thousand persons 
yearly can be carried thither at this present time. Thus 
Mr. Bacon, addressing the Society, in February, 1834, 
says, " I cannot but think it a mistaken kindness to send 
700 emigrants to Africa with our means, in a single 
year." [Af. Repos. XI. 361.) It will probably be ten 
years before the colony will be able to bear even the 
gradual annual addition of 2,000 in each year. But 

book. Could the Colonization Society have found no advocate 
more just, candid and veracious thnn Dr. Reese 1 or are advocates 
possessing better character, ashamed to appear ? 



46 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

during that period, the colored population will have in- 
creased more than 500,000, over and above the whole 
possible amount of deportation during that period. It 
will probably be twenty years, and it may be more, be- 
fore the colony can sustain 20,000 people, but during 
that same period, the colored population in this country 
will have increased by 2,000,000, and more. 

Rusticus cxpectat dum transeat amiiis ; at ille 
Labitur et labetur in omne volubilis aevura. 

which may thus be translated — 

The rustic waiting stands to see the flowing river dry 

Not thinking its high fountains, continuous streams supply : 

'Downward it comes and rolls, and will, till time itself shall die. 

By what calculation therefore is it, that the Coloniza- 
tion Society proposes to rid the United States of sla- 
very ?* Their process is as wise as that of Cudjo, who 
would have measured off the ocean with a quart pot. — 
But to give the Colonization Society credit for what it 
asks ; it supposes that such will be the state of society 
generally in the United States, and such its state in Li- 
beria, that the colored people will feel themselves im- 
pelled by " moral influences'^ to emigrate from this coun- 
try thither. That this might possibly be the case, if 
they were few in number, we shall not now question. 
But when thousands upon thousands of our colored 
population shall have found a comfortable home among 
us, as they will in spite of prejudice and oppression, 
— having really been " taught to admire our free in- 
stitutions," — before the colony of Liberia shall have 
reached even a population of 20,000, it will be no easy 
matter to persuade or coerce them away. But can, in- 
deed, colonizationists seriously hope that ever a period 
will arrive when thousands will go in one year across the 

* The scheme of Colonization, in order to be effectual, must 
contemplate and eftect the deportation at once of millions of la- 
borers, and the importation of at least one million to take their 
place ;" more than this ; it must, by miracle, work habits of in- 
dustry in the white population of the South. 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 47 

ocean to seek a home in Africa ? Tiiey ask for a cen- 
tury to complete their labor. When that has elapsed 
will they not as wisely ask for a century of centuries ? 
Indeed when we compare the requests of the Society 
witli the admission of one of its Vice Presidents in 1824, 
we can believe that nothing but the blindest infatuation 
could lead it to imagine itself adequate in any degree, to 
remove the colored population, or to induce them to 
remove. It will, in truth, require ages. " The removal 
of a few thousand individuals will^ in an evil of such 
magnitude^ produce hut little effect ; it will not mate- 
rially benefit this class of population themselves for it 
consists of more than a million and a half of persons, 
(1824; now, 1839, 3,000,000,) and though 3 or 400, 
000, already free, should be removed, the great polit. 
ical mischief among us will be but slightly affected." (R. 
J. Harper^ V. P., 1824, 7th Report, p. 8.) This passage 
is worthy the attention of all colonizationists. 

II. Let the community look in the face, all the difficul- 
ties with which this scheme is encumbered, and say, is 
success possible? Not only is it rendered impracticable 
by the vastness of the undertaking, but there are other 
obstacles. It is not merely problematical whether slave- 
masters will ever consent to part with their slaves through 
colonization influence. The difficulties in the way of 
persuading them are constantly increasing ; and indeed 
what has the Colonization Society to hope for from the 
rising generation of slave-holders, when the example of 
the present race, their fathers, teaches them the lawful- 
ness and propriety of slavery. — There are many nulli- 
fiers in the South, and there may yet be many more, 
some of whom seem almost ready to take up arms when- 
ever the general government offers to patronize the Co- 
lonization Society. — There are many abolitionists both 
in the North and in the South, who are increasing in 
strength and moral influence. — Then the colored people 
are themselves determined against the Society ; the free 
will scarcely go at all, and the slave will scarcely go un- 



48 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

less compelled. — There are the difficulties which attend 
every new settlement : difficulties which those accustom- 
ed to freedom find hard to contend with, and which are 
still harder to him who has been a slave all his life. 
Hence we find that many colonists at Liberia give way 
under them. — Even if we admit that Africa is a healthy 
country for the colored man, still we assert that it is less 
healthy than America. The colored people know this ; 
and endangering life first, in crossing the ocean and then 
in a new settlement, will and should be avoided whenever 
it well can be. — There are difficulties also with the na- 
tives. Since the first settlement at Monrovia, the colo- 
nists have had three pitched battles and two or three 
skirmishes with the natives. Does this fact show a pros- 
pect of amalgamation between the parties ? (see also Af, 
Repos.f X. 317,318.) — Moreover if thousands are willing 
to go, where are the means ? Settlers must be taken 
care of by the public there, till they are acclimated,* and 
if it has cost the Society, including $130,000 received 
from government for the settlement of recaptured Afri- 
cans, about $500,000 to build up a colony of 4000 
people, i. e. about $125 per head, including all expenses 

* Colonization agents pass through the country asking for $25, 
" to carry a man to Africa, and make him a freeman." Do they not 
know that it costs much more than this to settle an emigrant ? It 
costs $100 and more. Where then is the truth of their statements? 
Twenty.five dollars is the passage-fee. This is besides the ex- 
pense of the voyage, and, of keeping every emigrant for months. 
' How long does the seasoning last V ' From 3 to 24 months. 
* What would be necessary to enable a man to live comfortably, if 
he went from here to Liberia ?' ' A suitable set of utensils, fur- 
niture, clothes, for 2 or 3 years, enough of food to last till he could 
raise a crop.' {Questions to Jones, and replies. Af. Repos. X. 
318.) 

It is desirable that some person who has time, would estimate the 
number of deaths which have occurred in the colony, of Agents, «Scc., 
including children ; (see a list of emigrants, Af. Repos., X. 292,) 
and inquire how far the increase of the population by births has 
fallen short of that of the free colored people in the United 
States, and we shall have data from which the real prosperity of 
the country can be estimated. 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 49 

— to remove one million will at the same rate cost about 
one hundred and twenty-five millions of dollars. If from 
this be deducted $25,000,000, (the cost of transportation 
at twenty- five dollars a head, in American vessels,) the 
remainder would be a total loss to this country. If to 
this sum be added the money and goods transported 
thither with settlers, as sifts, there will be to the United 
States for settling 1,000,000 of colored persons a total 
loss of probably 150,000,000 of dollars.* Any action 
of Congress on the Society's own admission, is an action 
in favor of an association for the removal of Slavery. 
It must not expect that Southerners and Northerners 
will ever consent that the government shall violate the 
Constitution of the United States in its behalf. Had the 
Society the purse of the nation at its disposal, it has no 
right to use it, especially since both the justice and the 
benevolence of its scheme are more than questionable. 
III. But the Colonization scheme contains in hself the 
elements of self defeat. It admits, which ought never to 
be admitted, that slaves are property, Hence it endea- 
vors to conciliate the slave holders by admitting what 
they call their " rights" — (see speech of Cyrus Edwards, 
Af. Repos., VII. 100, and of Henry Clay, Af. Repos., 
VII. 13.) The attacks of Colonizationists upon those 
who advocate unconditional emancipation (except as they 
spring from retaliation or revenge, or mere malignity,) 
are based upon tliis, that one party admits, while the 
other denies, the right of property. — Now it is of the na- 
ture of property to be in demand, and to be produced, 
according to its value ; and its value at any one time 
is regulated by supply and demand. Slaves, by the 
rem.oval from their vicinity of the " dangerous" free col- 
ored people, or of those liberated for the purpose of re- 
moval, become more valuable, and the system of slavery 
is more safe. This is admitted by some colonizationists. 

* Compare on this topic Mr. Tazewell's report iii Senate U. S. 
1828. 



50 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

Thus if, by some process — poison or deportation — you re- 
move all the horses from the city of Philadelphia, there 
would soon be an influx of as many more from the sur- 
rounding country, and, until the demand was satisfied, 
they would be sold at an advanced price. But would 
the influx of a thousand horses into Philadelphia, in 
one week diminish the race, or remove it from the 
neighborhood'/ By no means. Horses are 'property. 
Farmers would be careful to retain as many as they 
wanted themselves, for labor and breeding: — destruc- 
tion of some within a given space would increase the 
value of the rest, and this would induce those who 
had the means, to breed more, until the equilibrium 
should again return. Destroy one-half the horses in the 
world, and the process would be the same in principle, 
though the relative value might never again be as low as 
it now is. Remove one-half the slaves from South Caro- 
lina, and while slaves are held as property, there would 
be an increased demand, and such an effort to supply 
it, that in a short time the same state of things as for- 
merly existed would return. So will it be, throughout 
the South. If one-half the slaves in the world were 
suddenly to die, while the principle that man may be held 
as property is acknowledged, the aggregate number 
would in a short time be nearly or quite what it was be- 
fore. If no other means would suflSce, masters would 
cohabit with their own slaves, that they might increase 
the number of their human chattels. Colonization in 
this view of it, while it renders slaves as property more 
secure, does but hold out a bait to the covetousness of 
slave holders, instead of diminishing the evils and rigors 
of slavery. 

Besides, if slaves were not acknowledged as property, 
the gradual emigration of hundreds of thousands, cannot 
so affect the great body of the colored race among us, 
as ever to render practicable the removal of the whole. 
What effect has emigration on Germany ? Thousands 
are every year seeking new settlements, and this has 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 51 

continued since the early days of Rome. But is Ger- 
many decreasing in population ? Ireland has sent off her 
thousands every year, for many years past. Is there 
any more room in Ireland for the English than at first ? 
All this emigration has not perceptibly diminished the 
ratio of the increase of population in Germany and Ire- 
land. The true state of this case appears by the follow- 
ing remarks. " In the year 1790, there were in that 
small portion of Virginia's territory, which lies between 
her blue ridge of mountains and her sea shore, 25,000 
more whites than blacks. Since that time we have been 
constantly engaged, from this same district, in colonizing 
with blacks the States of Georgia, South Carolina, Ken- 
tucky, Tennessee, Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and 
Florida, and yet in 1830, there were in that district, where 
this majority of 25,000 whites once existed, a majority 
of 81,000 blacks ; showing an increase, in forty years, of 
106,000 blacks. If with all the advantages of our thousands 
of scavengers, in the shape of negro-buyers,* who have 
been constantly and sedulously engaged in tending and 
nursing this filthy drain, this wonderful increase has oc- 
curred, what are we to expect in the next forty years ?"f 
{Mr. Roane, in the Virginia Legislature^ 1832.) Does 
the Colonization Society then hope to accomplish more 
in relation to the colored race among us, then all the op- 
pressions in Germany, Austria and Ireland, or even in the 
eastern part of Virginia (Maryland,) and in the District 
of Columbia, have accomplished in respect to those who 
dwell in those places respectively 1 Or does she intend 
to urge the North to drive away the already persecuted 
and tyrant-trodden colored race 1 — or, which is the same 
thing — does she intend to labor till the prejudice against 
color which urges the removal of that race, shall be en- 
throned in the National breast ? If so, and I fear it, — 

* Or Colonization packets, or transports. 

t During the year 1836, it is estimated that 120,000 slaves were 
exported from Virginia. These were worth on an average ^600 each, 
equal to $72,000,000. — During this period how many were colo 
nized in Africa from the the same State ? Not two hundred. 



42 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION 



she will stand convicted before God and her country of 
destroying the happiness and the Uberties of mihions. 

Sec. 3. Is the Colonization Society necessary ? 

Fourthly. Is the Colonization Society at all necessary ? 
Before proceeding to answer this query, which will be 
the last in relation to the Society, let us observe : — 

(1.) We consider the Colonization Society a scheme 
of INJUSTICE. '* Its movements do but sanction and en- 
courage, the most high-handed oppression. This it does 
by the admission of the principle that emancipation may 
be [and ought to be] conditioned on expatriation." 
(Phelps' Lectures, App. 278, 279.) 

(2.) Admitting that the scheme of Colonization will 
benefit Africa in a greater or less degree, it is not neces- 
sary if that benefit can be conferred in an equal or greater 
degree in some less exceptionable — some benevolent 
way.* 

(3.) It is very questionable whether the moral in flu- 
€nce of the Society can be very great or very good. 
When " weighed in the balance" of the divine law it is 
*' found wanting." For (1) it acknowledges that man 
may have property in his fellow man, thus encouraging 
sin ; (2) it admits the tyrant's plea of necessity for pre- 
sent acknowledged wrong ; — (3) its benevolence operates 
through prejudice ; (4) it enlists the covetousness of 
slaveholders in its behalf; (5) its influence stands decided- 
ly in the way of emancipation. 

Is then this Society necessary ? — it consumes money, 
employs the time of valuable men, and diverts the mind of 
benevolence, from other objects. Would it not be better 
for it to die ? " An honest death would be a thousand fold 
better for it than a life of fraud." [Gerrit Smith, then 
Vice President, Af, Repos., XI. 70.) If necessary, it is 
either as an abolition society, or as an institution for the 
promotion of some other benevolent enterprise. But it is 
neither. 

* Who can doubt that if slavery is abolished, multitudes of 
colored missionaries would be found for Africa ? 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 53 

1st. By its own admission "it is no abolition society." 
It passes many "censures on such societies." Take for 
an example the following, from the pen of its Secretary. 
" The Anti-Slavery Societies at the North, as at present 
conducted, are, I humbly conceive, staking the peace and 
safety of the country on a dangerous experiment." (J/. 
Repos., X. 137.) Some of the friends of the Society do 
indeed claim that it proposes the ultimate abolition of 
slavery, but on a condition — even according to their ad- 
mission — which we have shown to be impossible : — the 
removal of all the slaves. ^^ All emancipation, to hoicever 
small an extent, which permits the persons emancipated to 
remain in this country, is an evil. [First Report of the 
Colonization Society.) Thus colonizalionists are, in ef- 
fect, saying it is right to keep up and strengthen a system 
of robbery, lust, barbarism, and impiety, unless those who 
suffer by its continuance will leave, or be driven from the 
country. Hence we find scarcely any of the leading 
southern colonizationists emancipating their slaves. 
*' Such a state of affairs (they say) would be produced by 
universal emancipation, that we could not live in the 
United States." Perhaps by a change of conditions with 
tlie sufferers for a short time, they would better learn how 
to apply the fundamental principles of the Gospel.* If 
3,000,000 of the people of Europe were suffering under 
the pride, rapacity, lust, impiety, barbarity and luxury of 
3,000,000 of their neighbors, would the Colonization So- 
ciety justify the continuance of that oppression, till the 
oppressed would move beyond its reach ? The Society 
indeed devoutly prays for the abolition of the foreign 
slave-trade, but neglects the suffering poor at its own 
door. Against the piratical internal slave trade — though 
not inferior in atrocity to the distant evil so much de- 
plored — it never raises its voices. 

2d. Is this Society necessary as pursuing any other be- 
nevolent scheme ? The negative has been fully proved. 

* "And as ye would that men should do to you, do ye also to 
hem likewise." — Luke vi, 3l. 
A* 



54 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

It therefore cannot be prospered by Heaven. All the 
good to the colored race it has ever accomplished, might 
have been gained in a less objectionable manner, and in- 
finitely more would have been gained if it had never ex- 
isted. What if the colony is flourishing ? Would not the 
same number, nay an hundred fold the number of colored 
people have been in a better condition in this land, if Colo 
nization had never been heard of? Would not the recap 
tured Africans have been in better circumstances, if go 
vernment had located them somewhere in this country, 
and appropriated $130,000 for their benefit ? Coloniza 
tionists seem to be aware that as soon as slavery is abo 
lished, their scheme falls to the ground. Hence the be 
nevolence of Finley is prostituted to the worst of pur 
poses. Were he and his heavenly-minded coadjutor, 
Samuel J. Mills, alive on earth, they would disown the 
company which at present claims ihem : we doubt not 
they look down from heaven upon them with pity. 

Sec. 4. Concluding Remarks. 

If it were admitted that the Colonization Society is ad- 
vancing a benevolent scheme ; that the scheme is practi- 
cable, though requiring centuries to complete it ; that it 
is exercising a beneficial influence on Africa ; that it has 
a right to apply to the general government for support ; — 
in short were most admitted that Colonizationists in gene- 
ral ask ; — would it not be the duty of the same to pro- 
mote the abolition of slavery in other ways ?* 

* If the Colonization Society adhered strictly to the letter of its 
constitution, it could not deport one slave entrusted to it, for the 
purpose of freeing him. (See Const, of Col. Soc. Art. I. and II,) 
It stepped out of its proper sphere, when it entered upon the re- 
moval of slaves, not of actual freemen, and has thus become a 
tool in the hands of tyrants, to remove those who would not have 
gone if they could have had their freedom here, and who were only 
willing to go because they had no alternative. A person may 
leave his slaves free by will — by " misguided piety or death-bed de- 
vice," as Mr. Harrison says, or "sudden conviction of injustice." 
(Af, Repos., III. 197.) His executors construe this freedom condi- 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 55 

Admitting that the Society is right in its position, that 
slavery must and will be removed, why does it so con- 
stantly strike at the abolitionist ? Is it because the latter 
condemns its principles ? Then it should be able to show 
that those principles are founded in reason and religion, 
and not upon prejudice. 

Though once the writer was a Colonizationist, an agent 
of the Society, and served it to the best of his ability, be- 
cause he cannot on maturer reflection and more know- 
ledge approve its principles, he feels it his duty to preach, 
pray, write, and speak against it. 

Being requested by a friend to read "Jay's Inquiry," 
he felt so hostile to it, that he deferred it as long as he 
well could. He heard of " Reese's Reply," and still de- 
ferred reading the former till he could read the latter also. 
In the meantime it pleased God to show him the sin of 
slavery in all cases. Objections then naturally started in 
his mind, to the scheme of Colonization, principally at 
first on the score of its insufficiency, which he had in part 
before believed. He spent days and nights in the exam- 
ination of the African Repository, and the Reports of the 
Society. The result of the examination may be seen in 
the present attempt to disseminate the truth on this sub- 
ject of inexpressible importance. 

Judge Jay and Dr. Reese. 

Notwithstanding the " Imprimatur^^ of such names as 
those which appear in Dr. Reese's reply to Judge Jay, 
the candid and careful reader will find in it, much blinking 
of the question, — *' much irrelevant matter," and not a 
little blustering and egotism. None of Jay's important 
charges against the Colonization Society are answered or 
refuted. Jay affirms that the Colonization Society pro- 
poses itself as the only remedy for slavery, and backs his 
charge by quotations from the published papers of the So- 
ciety. Does his opponent grapple with the charge ? He 

tional on their removal, and applying to the Colonization Society, 
they are removed. (See Af. Rcpos., XI. 184, 1st and 4th cases of 
emancipation mentioned.) 



66 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

denies it flatly, in the face of evidence, and shows that the 
Constitution of the Society says nothing about it ! (see Jay, 
p. 104. Reese, p. 4.) Jay affirms that the Colonization 
Society opposes the moral cultivation of the colored popu- 
lation at home. Dr. Reese shows that some Coloniza- 
tionists do not. Yet the fact is, Colonizationists generally 
have made no effort to instruct the colored race, except 
with the hope that they will emigrate to Africa. (See, for 
instance, the Constitution of the " African Education So- 
ciety,^^ Washington City, &c.) Jay asserts that the Colo- 
nization Society assails and villifies abolitionists. Dr. 
Reese "records" his " unequivocal denial." This denial, 
however, is not founded on truth, if we may believe others. 
Thus Mr. Smith, then a Colonizationlst, admits the charge. 
(Af Repos., XI. 70, 71. See also the quotation from 
Secretary Gurley, above, Af Repos., X. 137, and Vol. 
XII. of Repository passim.) Jay affirms that the Society 
excuses and justifies slaveholders. Dr. Reese knows that 
not only himself, but Colonizationists generally, express 
sympathy for the slaveholders. But not to dwell upon all 
the misstatements and special pleading^ of the latter, (see 
Reese, pp. 2, 4, 9, 16, 35,58, 94, 111, 112, 114, &c.,) 
let the candid reader examine for himself Even the 
Christian Spectator, a warm Colonization paper, com- 
plains " of the slighting terms which Dr. Reese has ap- 
plied in his preface, to the work of Jay, not so much be- 
cause they are slighting, as because they are not founded 
as we think in truth ; pp. of preface 5, 7." (See Quart. 
C. Spec. Sept. 1835, p. 513.) 

That the cause of truth and justice will be promoted by 
such a book as that of Dr. Reese, few candid well-inform- 
ed persons will affirm. It is indeed, as he says, a pity 
" that some abler hand had not been assigned for the task," 
for which he harnessed himself. One possessing an abler 
pen, a better heart, and a more candid mind — himself a 
munificent patron of the Colonization Society — admitted 
that in respect to the question of slavery, it " had de- 
parted from the neutrality of its constitution." (African 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 57 

Repository, XI. 67,) The success of Dr. Reese's de- 
fence, however, may be estimated from a remark of the 
Christian Spectator, a co-champion of the same " client.* 
" We need follow Dr. Reese no further, only to add, that 
Mr. Jay's apparent inconsistencies are made such, only 
by Dr. Reese withholding the connection and bearings in 
which the passages are found." (C. Spectator, p. 514.) 
Was this the Doctor's " special pleading" — or was it 
sterling honesty ? 

Dr. Reese and many of his friends are pleased to charge 
all the members of the Anti-Slavery Society with being 
"fanatics," {preface, p. 8,) but neither has he proved his 
accusation, nor is it true. 

1. Dr. Reese has not proved that they are fanatics. 
Here is his charge, accompanied, with his reason. *' If 
the members of the Anti-Slavery Society were not all fa- 
natics, they would by this time discover, what is palpably 
manifest to every body else, that their doctrines afid 
measures are only inflicting accumulating and irreparable 
mischiefs upon the oppressed race, for whose welfare and 
happiness they profess exclusive zeal and benevolence, 
and for whose good, many of them are doubtless consci- 
entiously laboring. In the name of the afflicted free 
blacks of the North and the South, I would point chem to 
the new and oppressive legislation which they have pro- 
voked by their ill-timed endeavors, and the rash impet- 
uosity of their blind and mistaken zeal. And in behalf 
of the slaves of this land, I would invoke their humanity 
and religion, while groaning under already intolerable 
laws, and beseech them to withhold themselves from efforts, 
which in their results have already aggravated the num- 
ber and severity of the privations and hardships which 
bondage inflicts." {Preface, pp. 8, 9.) This reason, 
thus sophistically assigned, is " special pleading" for ty- 
rants. We would commend to Dr. Reese's notice, at 
least a part of the following words : 

" O for a world in principle as chaste, 
As this is gross and selfish ! over which 



68 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

Custom and prejudice shall bear no sway, — 
Nor cunning justify the proud man's wrong — 
Leaving the poor no remedy but tears,^* SfC. {Task, VI.) 

Is not the Doctor's pleading an endeavor to "justify the 
proud man's wrong?" Had Dr. Reese been a Roman in 
the time of the early emperors, for the same reason he 
now invokes abolitionists to cease their " conscientious 
efforts!" he would then have besought the preachers of 
the gospel to cease condemning the sports and games, the 
gladiatorial shows, the circus, saturnalia, &c. (none of 
which are by name condemned in Scripture,) lest their 
condemning these should be the occasion of " more op- 
pressive legislation" against their fellow Christians. On 
the same principle he would have urged Martin Luther 
and others not to inveigh so bitterly against the tyranny of 
the papal See, lest their boldness in reproving sin, should 
provoke the monster Leo X. and his successors, more 
cruelly to injure the Waldenses, persecute the Huguenots 
and inquisitorially murder Jews and Christians. On this 
same principle, he would have besought the Redeemer not 
so openly to condemn the traditions of the Pharisees, 
least he should be persecuted ; and the apostles to forbear 
preaching Christ, lest the Sanhedrim should resent it ! — 
On the other hand an eminent Colonizationist (then such) 
tells us, that efforts for the good of others are not to be 
arrested because they are accompanied with incidental 
sufferings. This *' involves a doctrine which would stop 
the wheels as well of divine as human benevolence ; — the 
Anti-Slavery Society therefore is not to be blamed, if it 
shall be, as we have supposed it may become, the innocent 
occasion of sufferings to some of the objects of its benevo- 
lent solicitude." {Gerrit Smith, Af. Repos., XL 66.) 

Dr. Reese is an advocate of *' health and temperance." 
He condemns tight-lacing and the use of malt-liquors, 
(See ''Strictures'' by D. M. Reese, M. D., New-York, 
1825.) If the Doctor's strictures had enraged the corset- 
makers and brewers, and induced them to labor more ef- 
fectually and more fatally to introduce their respective 



VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 59 

articles of manufacture into use, would not he have been 
guilty of all this ? Doubtless ! 

Not the abolitionist, but slavery is the cause of that 
"oppressive legislation" superadded to already intolera- 
ble laws. Let Dr. Reese think of the 70,000 members 
of his own church who are in slavery, (p. 116,) and ask 
God whether He will not avenge His own poor. 

2. Abolitionists are not fanatics. This charge is not 
preferred by Dr. Reese alone, but is repeated again and 
again by the editors of the public papers, from some of 
whom, such as those of the New York Observer, better 
tilings might be expected, than that they would thus revile 
their fellow-men, and fellow Christians, and thus keep 
company with the real fanatics and incendiaries of the 
South. 

What is fanaticism ? for the term is often used by those 
who " want information" respecting its true meaning. 
" Fanaticism,'* says a most discriminating writer, " is 
ENTHUSIASM INFLAMED BY HATRED. After quitc rejecting 
from our account that opprobrious sense of the word fa- 
naticism which the virulent calumniator of religion and 
of the religious assigns to it, it will be found, as we be- 
lieve, that the elementary idea attaching to the term in its 
manifold applications, is that of fervor in religion^ render- 
ed turbulent^ morose or rancorous^ by junction with some 
one or more of the unsocial emotions.' " {Fanaticism, p. 
21.) Now it cannot be maintained with the least show of 
evidence, that abolitionists are, in their religion, which Dr. 
Reese allows them, (pp. 8, 9.) inflamed with hatred to- 
wards any individual, or that they are under the influence 
of "unsocial emotions." Their contest with their fellow- 
men, is an effort to render the social emotions triumphant. 
We do not charge Dr. Reese and his associates with be- 
ing fanatics, (this might be as ungentlemanly and unbe- 
coming in us as it was in himself,) but we beg them can- 
didly to inquire and see who are most under the influence 
of unsocial emotions, — the slaveholder and his patron the 
Colonizationist on the one hand, or on the other hand, the 



60 VIEWS OF COLONIZATION. 

abolitionist who seeks to destroy the detestable aod unso- 
cial feeling that the colored race must remove from Ameri. 
ca. As respects the elements of liinaticism, (see Fanati- 
cism, p. 54) will some dispassionate inquirer tell us whe- 
ther they enter most into the composition of that scheme 
which calls aloud upon all men^ everywhere^ now and 
ALWAYS to do justice to all, or that which concludes 
that God has placed an insurmountable barrier — " through 
corrupt favoritism^" between members of the same gene 
ral family ? Abolitionists do not contend that '"'special 
favors are granted to nations, to families, and to individij. 
als, who are honored and benefited by immense advan- 
tages, notwithstanding enormous delinquencies." {Fa- 
naticism, p. 272.) This is slavery as supported by 
Charlestonians " on moral and scriptural grounds," (see 
Resolution of City of Charleston, Aug. 1835,) or in a 
milder form — emancipation necessarily accompanied with 
deportation. The true Christian, however, is taught the 
very reverse of this in the Bible. " Exclusiveness of feel- 
ing is denied him, nor can he harbor that grudging of 
grace, which distinguishes the fanatic." (p. 276.) t)r. 
Reese and the pro-slavery defenders should have charity 
enough, while their fellow Christians declare these to be 
their rules of action, to believe them sincere. It is to be 
hoped that Colonizationists will not any longer wilfully 
say " Raca" and " thou fool" to brethren ! — Let me con- 
elude by desiring the attention of such, and of all who sneer 
at plain and homely truths, because they thwart unreason- 
able prejudices, to the following language, addressed by 
Bishop Horsley to the British House of Lords. " Beware 
how you are persuaded to brmg under the opprobrious 
name of fanaticism, the regard which you owe to the great 
duties of justice and mercy ; for the neglect of which, if 
you should neglect them, you will be answerable at that 
tribunal where no prevarication of witnesses can misin- 
form the Judge — where no subtlety of an advocate, mis- 
calling the names of things, ' putting evil for good and 
good for evil,' can mislead his judgment." {Speech against 
slave trade, July, 1799.) 



LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 





011 897 654 A 






r"^ 



^^JKri ■ 


; V 


j-^ ■ ■■ '^W{:5.>'r^- 




^^-"•^- ." T'v- -'^ 


-- , 


^^0l%i^^^ 


4sP 


' A ^\j. ■ \ '-^ ^^Wy ■ "^"^S---^ 


l^-^^^rv 


Nf ^'"'vT '"'^^-/ i '■'- 


'a !-4/^ 


A ./(/^ / --.V-y^T 


■1^^^\' 


._>^ / *'-:;r4--: M V' 


' \ 



\rm 



